Stay With Me
by Come Around Sunrise
Summary: Drama: Injustice-inspired short AU focusing on the video game's relatively unexplored relationship between Superman, Wonder Woman, and Superman. *RATED M for MATURE.*
1. Chapter 1

_**Author's Note:**_

I bought _Injustice: Gods Among Us_ at a Steam® sale about a couple of years or so ago and I, especially when playing as Aquaman and The Flash, enjoyed it quite a lot. However, let's talk about the story; I'm usually not a big fan of anything to do with Warner Bros and their writing of the world's greatest superheroes but I'm digressing...

So, the story, which when you just take it as it at first glance I thought portrayed a lot of the main characters waaay warped and out of character. But on deeper thought, when you try to understand why they (Superman especially) acted like they did in the game's continuity…suddenly it's not black and white anymore and I as a Superman fan (come at me, bro) do find myself sympathising with some of his actions even for a little bit. It got me wondering and hence this short story was inspired by one or two cutscenes from the game's narrative. It's been shelved for a while so I just decided to post it. It should be completed not before I post another chapter (very soon) on my other, longer story, regarding which I apologise for for leaving dormant for almost a year now.

PLOT SUMMARY: Clark arrives on One Earth and he's the first to make contact with Regime Superman and Regime Wonder Woman, leading to huge repercussions for both his Earth and One Earth.

This is my own take on the game's storyline with a **generous amount of liberties taken**. Please feel free to criticise or point out any typos, also feel free to hit up the DC Wikia for a crash course on the game's plot if you're not familiar with it.

 _Injustice: Gods Among Us and all associated characters is property of Warner Bros. and DC Comics._

* * *

" **INSERT LEX LUTHOR QUOTE ABOUT PARALLEL UNIVERSES HERE"**

 **Stay With Me**

Unfamiliar and totalitarian. That was what Clark Kent: Superman saw and thought as he flew around the city where he knew Metropolis was supposed to be. This was the city he loved, the city he protected, he knew as much when he spotted the globe of _The Daily Planet_ spinning atop a monolith.

It looked to be an alternate reality, he thought, a future version of Metropolis. He was fairly certain of it too, as the existence of alternate universes were not foreign concepts to him. The problem was though that his perfect memory can't remember how he got here. He remembered being sent back to the future a few years ago when Toyman zapped him. Now though, the last thing he remembered doing this time around was drinking coffee, and now all of a sudden he's here.

Looking around, Metropolis seemed to be about a few decades advanced; he noted that the cars looked like the ones in 80s time travel movies. If he had time, he could take a sample from the old tree at the park and carbon date it, but things seemed a bit too pressing to call in a favour from the museum lab.

Anyway, he can just simplify things by picking up a newspaper but he couldn't find a single stand anywhere. Speaking of things he couldn't find, he noticed that there was barely anybody out. He scanned further until he saw a massive gathering of people a few blocks away, like a rally or something.

Clean air entered his lungs as he flew over the crowd of people gathered around a large pavilion. He meant to stay concealed, but the cameras instantly tracked upon his presence. Gasps along with whispering murmurs rolled around the crowd as his image came into the large screen up front. He saw all the faces turn white at the proud gold and red crest of his family emblazoned on his blue uniform as he came into focus.

He floated down to the stage area up front. Black-clad guards with guns were there to greet him,

Remembering his manners, Clark greeted the man in charge, "Good afternoon…" he read his ID through his Kevlar vest "…Captain James."

The one in charge looked surprised at the Kryptonian's appearance but saluted him nonetheless. "High Councillor, you're most welcome. We apologise but we weren't expecting you today, sir."

"Okay…?" Clark furrowed an eyebrow as he looked questioningly at the captain, "Can you tell me what this is all for?" he asked as he pointed to the crowd with his eyes.

"I can brief you on the situation. Come right this way, sir." James gestured for Clark to walk alongside, "As of a few hours ago, there have been a few incidents of misdemeanour around this area lately." Clark's ears perked up, expecting the officer to explain some connection to a known figure from his rogues' gallery. "You'll be pleased to know that we've caught the perpetrators in question and we'll be presenting them to the public today." the captain finished.

Potential figures of crime ran through his mind, Metropolis is a great city but it had its fair share of maniacs. Some things never change, he assumed.

"Who are they? They didn't harm anyone, did they?" he asked, very much interested in what the captain had to say. Maybe he could question some of these guys to prevent any crimes happening in his universe.

"Just some nobodies but rotten apples nonetheless." the captain said. "We apprehended them without any trouble."

"Oh." Clark replied, somewhat feeling the effects of a mild anti-climax, "Is this some sort of a community service thing?" he asked, not quite understanding the scope of the charges against them.

That got a chuckle out of Captain James, causing Superman to raise an eyebrow at him. The captain cleared his throat, "No, sir. They're being brought here to be used as an example against this sort of behaviour in the future."

"I don't get it. What exactly did they do?"

The captain readied his breath. "They're guilty of demonstrating, sir."

Now Clark really didn't get it. "Demonstrating? Were they violent?" he tried to clarify.

"Fortunately no, we quelled their protest before they had any chance of causing any more dissent."

"So, these people you speak of demonstrated…how?"

"The usual, vocal display sort of demonstration, sir. Right outside in front of the government building."

"Is that all?" Clark asked incredulously

"Camera feeds proved everything, sir. This is a Class 1A offence under the latest revised One Earth constitution." James sounded like a sci-fi soldier as he spoke to Clark through his helmet radio.

"1-A?" Clark repeated, thoroughly confused.

"Yes, sir. Punishable by capital punishment or long term incarceration in discretion of the local authority, if I recall correctly." James stated.

"Capital punishment?!" Clark blurted.

The captain started sweating, "Yes, High Councillor. Unless you want to override the ruling I've decided on."

 _What kind of constitution must Metropolis have to be capitally punishing citizens for protesting?_ Clark wondered as he thought on his feet. "Ruling overruled." he quickly said. "I want to see these people, if that's alright."

"Right this way, sir." James obeyed as he led Clark into a containment cell. He imagined a bunch of people being disgruntled and uncooperative. But inside were only two very skinny teenager types, a girl and a boy who looked like they were siblings. They must've been no older than twenty. They were blindfolded and their hands were cuffed behind them and among their body he could see were fresh-looking cuts and bruises.

He remembered taking part in a student rally back when he was twenty and the authorities didn't do anything to him. Obviously things were a bit more complicated once he revealed his alien self to the public but freedom of speech was a right he took for granted.

"Just the two of them?" Clark remarked. "What kind of trouble might they have caused?"

The two teenagers shivered upon hearing his voice.

"We do not give anyone the benefit of the doubt, sir."

"Can we take the blindfolds and the cuffs off?" Clark asked, instantly a trooper went round and unbound the two.

The two adolescents opened their eyes to the dazzle caused by the bright ceiling light, only to see the High Councillor himself.

"Leave us, please." Clark said to the guards. They obeyed. He looked concernedly at the two kids, "Are you two alright?"

They practically cowered in fear when looked at directly by who used to be the Man of Steel, but was known colloquially now as the Man of the Iron Fist. The girl grasped the boy's hand and they both held on for dear life itself.

Clark's concern multiplied tenfold. "Hey, hey," he tried to ease them gently. "I'm not here to hurt you. I just want to talk."

Clark's voice was calm and beseeching, or at least he hoped so. His low tenor just made the two teens even more nervous. Clark didn't know what else to do but he tried anyway. He sat down next to the two teens, he crouched until he was head level with them. He said, with that endearing farm-boy smile and unreal sky blue eyes of his, "I promise I won't do anything. Superman always keeps his promises."

The girl relaxed enough to gather her nerves and bravado, "Lucy." she told him. She looked over to her brother, "This is Tom."

Clark held his hand out as if in an interview, but still with his farm-boy smile he said, "Pleased to meet you both. My name is Superman. Or Kal-El. Call me whichever you please."

Lucy gulped. She'd only seen this man this close on TV, and even the 8K, 240Hz full colour displays of their time weren't enough to capture his domineering presence when encountered in the flesh. It made one want to trust him, to loosen even, and at a push; _submit._

"Can you guys tell me why you're in trouble?" Clark asked.

The two didn't answer, but Clark waited patiently. He tried to ease the tension, "One day, The Manhunter caught The Flash nabbing his cookies, but Flash never wanted to admit it…"

The two didn't respond to his levity, so Clark continued with nonchalance, "…pinned it on me too! Manhunter tried to read his mind but his brain moved too quick, so we had to ask Wonder-"

"We're sorry, Superman. We didn't mean to cause so much trouble." Tom blurted.

"Hey, it's not a problem. I just want to get to the bottom of this." Clark interjected, his tone more level now. The two of them shivered in a synchronised tremor, but Clark quickly reassured them, "But go on. I want to listen, not judge."

"It just felt like no one was listening to us or willing to help us. We tried everything we could but we kept getting nowhere." explained Lucy, the two looking at the floor. Clark could hear their hearts beating as fast as they could.

Superman sounded concerned, "Can you tell me what was wrong?"

"We live in a foster home." answered Lucy. "We just wanted to know why."

Clark asked as sensitively as he could. "Are your foster parents taking good care of you?"

It took a while but Lucy answered, "Yes."

"Hmm. One moment, guys."

Clark thought about what he just heard and saw. He approached the captain to ask for information about their circumstances. It'd turned out that social services had put them in a youth hostel because their parents haven't been there to care for them since they were 13. It seemed like their parents suddenly disappeared and the state had to intervene.

Clark had seen these type of cases before, both in his work as Clark Kent and sometimes when he attended charity events for the Wayne Foundation or the Themysciran Embassy in either one of his personas.

He decided to dig up some more background information and learnt that the hostel Lucy and Tom were in was state-run and regulated, and the youths admitted there were well cared for by the federal government.

Clark wondered. They were well cared for, but that obviously didn't substitute for any answers they wanted to seek. He could relate to that, he once felt the same when he realised that Martha and Jonathan couldn't possibly be his genetic parents.

He sympathised with Tom and Lucy, they were young and they were lacking their mother and father. Whereas he had Martha and Jonathan growing up, he felt that loneliness often when he thought about Lara and Jor-El. He too sometimes felt the desire to rebel out of his isolation. But his answers came anyway when his dad showed him the crystal that was the key to his past.

These kids were bereft of the love only their parents could give; that much he could understand. But it still wasn't clear to him why there was no information available to them, and why it got them into so much trouble.

He thanked the captain, who gave him another salute. The men kept referring to him as the High Councillor, which disturbed him greatly. He was never one to lord his authority, and this city…there must be something more to it than simply being a future version Metropolis.

He knew the dangers of interfering with the events of a parallel timeline. But at the same time, he wanted to get to all the bottom of this; why were they calling him as the 'High Councillor'? Why are the laws so strict? If this was a possible future event in his own timeline, maybe he could learn a few things before trying to find some way back. After all, the future is only written by the present and not by itself.

He returned to the two, "I've read your case file but there are some things I'd like for you tell me. Can you tell me about your parents?" he asked sensitively. They stiffened, but once more Clark waited patiently.

"They're not here." Lucy finally answered, still not bringing her eyes up to look at the High Councillor.

"Do you know where they are?" Clark asked with a concerned tone. The file on these two mentioned that their parents were gone, but it didn't say specifically why.

"We were told that they were in re-education."

That word shocked Clark. "What for?"

Tom's nervousness permeated his answer, "Protesting against the government." he blurted. The two were expecting the full wrath of the High Councillor. Such an egregious offence committed by their parents would only lead to reprimand.

"I'm sorry about that," he said softly. The two actually blinked at him. Their identical brown eyes flashed perplexingly before turning away. Clark could sense their fear, he'd worked for years to show people that they didn't need to be scared of him. The list of questions in his head grew.

"Is there anything else you could tell me about them?"

Lucy took a deep breath, "They're in prison." she whispered, wondering why he would ask such a thing if he was the one that laid down these laws in the first place.

"How long for?" he pressed sensitively.

"For life."

Clark's face contorted in pain for them. Not only where the laws draconian here, it seemed that freedom of speech was a bygone too. Clark, in his day job at the _Planet_ protested against government decisions whenever the situation called for it and people paid to read what he had to say. He was a very good analyst, so he was told, because he didn't pay any mind to whose toes he might step on.

"You two must've known the consequences of protesting against the government when you did so." He surmised.

Both their hearts skipped a beat, and Clark could hear their twin heartbeats thudding in their chests. Lucy simply nodded at him as she mumbled "Yes sir", too ashamed to look him in the eye.

A Class 1A offence. Punishable by life incarceration or death. If they knew the consequences of shoplifting in this world, then why would they do it? What would getting yourself killed grant you? Suicidal tendencies out of depression perhaps? Clark mulled over it, thinking that they must have an ultimate motive for committing what was inherently a severe crime.

In this world, voicing against the government will land you in prison. Why the hell would they want to follow in their parents' footsteps?

The circumstances clicked in his head.

Maybe these two wanted to see their parents. They committed the crime in the dire hope that they would be sent to the same prison and see their parents again. Clark's heart broke for them. They had to risk death and accept imprisonment just for a slim chance of seeing their loved ones. Whatever society he was in, it was not what Superman would stand for.

He blurred and went looking for the captain. "Captain James?"

"Sir?" he was typing on a computer as he turned round to face Clark. "I assume you want to switch the sentences for those two to Procedure B?" James asked presumably.

Clark thought about what he was going to say next. He had already made up his mind, but he was contemplating the consequences. He was going to use his position to interfere in another universe, but at the same time he'll never be able to look himself in the eye ever again if he let those two kids die.

"No," Clark answered tersely.

"Understood, I'll have them executed by the hour." said the captain, thinking the High Councillor would do publicly what he did so many times before.

"No!" Clark's spine shuddered at the thought of Lucy and Tom being summarily executed in public. It sickened him that Metropolis and society had devolved into such a state. What was the League of this universe doing?

Superman said in a tone that discouraged any dispute, "No, Captain James. You are going to let those two free."

The Captain looked at the High Councillor as if he'd grown two heads. "Are you sure, sir?" he reacted.

"You heard me, Captain. And I want their parents released from the prison they're in." Clark said with a straight, determined face, his blood curdling as he wondered how many times this Captain James had executed people before.

 _Three heads_. "As you wish, Councillor." the captain hastily obeyed. No one second-guessed the High Councillor's orders and he was lucky he didn't get burnt on the spot when he'd done so a second ago.

Clark let out a breath of relief when the captain went into another room. Giving orders or being followed was not something he enjoyed. He tried to lead by example. When chairing League matters he made sure that all decisions were democratic, much to the chagrin of the likes of Bruce, who believed that the Bat-way of doing things was the best way regardless; and Arthur, who as a monarch was used to commanding, ordering and having his word taken as law.

Well, the thing was that Clark was not any of them. As far as he was concerned he was just in the League because he knew that even a Superman cannot do it alone, being unanimously elected as the de-facto C.O. was only just an attachment to what his real purpose was.

As powerful as she was compared to him, sometimes even Diana would urge him to be more assertive. But he would steadfastly reinforce his stance in that he was only one voice in a League of many. Autocracy was definitely not his thing. Superman was just an example, a symbol, an ideal. Not the head on top of people's backs. Clark was sure that nothing in the foreseeable future could've changed that.

Captain James came back with a retina scanner. "Sir, we're just going to need your authorisation and the pardons will be validated. Stryker's should get the executive order within minutes." he informed.

Clark let the contraption scan his irises as he and James signed off on the pardons. "All done, High Councillor. The family's records have been erased."

Clark thanked the captain cordially as he went back to check on Lucy and Tom.

"Do you guys know how to get home from here?"

"Yes sir." they answered meekly.

"Good. You're free to go, guys." Clark smiled warmly at them, "And I'm sure there will be two people who'll be waiting for you."

Lucy and Tom's shock turned into gratitude as their eyes brightened. They bade their thanks to Superman as they left. Superman's heart warmed, he loved doing what he did. Seeing the smiles on the two's faces was worth all the effort.

But his happiness faded just as quickly as it had flared up. This world, he's been here barely any time at all and he could see everything was already wrong.

Firstly, they acknowledged him as the High Councillor, which meant in the least that his counterpart definitely existed, as well as held power and authority here. Superman was a figure that held and wielded power, but he would never have anyone obey his word if there was a choice. What troubled him the most, though, is how this world's Superman could allow this society to exist.

In dire need of answers, Superman flew north to his Fortress. He knew it would be there. Getting home can wait. He will not let this madness continue if he could do anything to help it.


	2. Chapter 2

She was pressed against the shower wall, the cold and smooth tiles doing nothing to temper the heat enveloping her body. She was on the verge of being assaulted and she had no desire to fight back. In fact, she wanted more.

His hands were clamped possessively around her hips, pinning her backside to the wall. He felt her fingers clawing his hair, pulling him to her in return. Gods, she wanted him.

He placed brandishing kisses from her long, delicious neck to the lascivious valley between her luscious breasts, continuing southwards as he knelt down in front of her, hands stills on her hips. For a man known for superspeed, she thought that he was even better when he decided to go _super-slow._ Aphrodite, his pace was driving her crazy.

"Tell me what you want." he whispered gruffly, his hot breath fanning the entrance to her desire.

He lifted one of her long and perfectly legs and hooked it over his shoulder, placing feathery kisses on the insides of her thigh as he did so. After a round of moaned satisfaction and yearning, she looked down at him, "I want-"

He didn't let her finish, he already knew what she wanted and he had no plans to deny her. Desperate and slow moans of torture escaped her open mouth as he touched her extremely sensitive pebble with his knowing lips. His teeth followed suit, coaxing a sharp spike of sensation as she writhed in painful pleasure.

"Oh, Kal…"

She was gloriously aroused, and her taste drove him to near madness. He was super everywhere, including his taste buds. He couldn't get enough of her, and her moans only spurred him on. He lapped, licked, sucked, tasted, everything he could do physically with his mouth he did to her. Seeing her hovering on the greatest of ecstasies as a result of his doing was his drug.

His hands clamped harder around her derriere, forcing her to stay still. But not for long. Her hips began forcefully gyrating and she ground her pelvis to his unrelenting mouth in sensual offering. Her senses were completely dulled, helplessly amplifying the electric way he licked and ate out her womanhood.

His vibrating tongue was brazenly wreaking havoc in tandem with his lips. Her moans of pleasure turned into mindless, wanton screams of lust that only he would ever have the privilege of revelling in.

"Kal…gods…Kal…baby…!" she bit back the expletive ready to roll off her tongue. She whimpered longingly when he pulled back.

He looked up at her, his irises flashing red, his tone was erotic in her ears, "Rao, you taste so good."

He went back to his devious work, his hands now moving to caress her slowly up her hips around and around as he did so, making her whole body shiver in delight.

Diana's breath sawed out of her lungs in the form of moans, whimpers, gasps and screams. She was so close. She could see the light in the back of her eyes, and mindlessly she realised that she had closed them an eternity ago. He was slowly driving her up a flight of stairs that only led to a sharp cliff of ecstasy. She was about to fall off the final step when he abruptly stopped and stood up. "No...Kal…please…" she whined depravedly as she fisted his hair in desperation.

His expression looked grave as his red-ringed cerulean eyes bore into her blue-grey ones. She moved one of her hands to caress his rock-hard shaft but he grasped her wrists haltingly,

He cupped her cheek with his other hand, "My beautiful Queen, I want you to concentrate on what I'm about to do to you…"

His large, powerful hand on her cheek slowly moved downward, grazing her stomach and then onwards to cup her throbbing warmth, making her gasp. She gasped again as his other hand went to pay attention to an erect nipple. He leaned into her ear, lapping up a tasty earlobe.

"…and I want you to come only when I tell you to." his erotic growl sent sensual shudders through her spine.

Cruel, he was being so cruel. He knew she was going to erupt, it was inevitable as the rise and fall of the Sun. But he also knew that the longer she spent teetering over the edge, the further her fall was going to be. He wanted her every orgasm to be better than the last. He wanted her to know that he would do everything in his power to please her.

"Not yet, Diana. Don't you even dare." he whispered in a way so silent but commanding at the same time.

Hera, she wanted so badly to disobey him! To scream out and let herself die a lovely, joyous and frenzied death. But she forced herself to postpone it, she'd do it gladly if only to satisfy him. She savagely ran her hands through his thick hair, down to his nape, and clawed at his back. She had to touch him, to claim him as he grunted in appreciation of her.

He slipped his middle finger in her in her tight glove and thumbed her swollen nub, stroking the oh-so-sensitive roof of her and all the while caressing her nipple with his other hand and tasting her earlobe with his moist tongue and lips. Just this was more than enough, he mused, but she didn't deserve 'enough'; she deserved everything he could give her.

His hand…his fingers… his tongue…he vibrated all of them, at the oscillation he knew would make her scream.

The sensation was too much, "KAL! Oh…!"

"Now, Diana." he purred into her ear.

Diana felt her stomach coil and snap at the same time, releasing a torrent of sensation from the broken dam of delight.

He moaned as kept on doing what he was doing, encouraging her to let it all out. He didn't stop his attentive caresses until he could feel the waves of passionate pleasure cease to pour out of her.

She found herself unable to form a single coherent sound. It was a long time before she stopped crying out his name and came down from heaven, punctuating her return with a half moan, half sob "…Kal!"

"Did you like that?" he asked tenderly, still nibbling her ear, still caressing her backside as if to ease her from her high.

She giggled, and as a result Kal laughed. She was still feeling the aftershocks and he was pleased with the results of his perseverance. Diana beamed at him, her eyes dreamily locked into his as if dazed.

When she felt her bones again, she seductively moved her hands to caress his powerfully sculpted chest. He was so irresistible, so virile, and so capable of making her weak at the knees. She placed her arms about his neck and claimed his mouth in a heated and passionately wet kiss. The water of the shower did nothing to cool them down.

"Baby…that was amazing…you are amazing…" she breathily whispered into his warm skin as she leaned in to nuzzle his tightly muscled collar area.

"You think so? I was going for amazing." he smirked.

Diana wrapped her arms possessively around his hips and pressed her chest into his, biting his lower lip as she did so. Before he could respond, Diana forcefully turned them both around and reversed their previous positions.

She sighed happily, for his ears only, "And now you're going to receive 'amazing'."

It was her turn to push him into the now warm shower wall.


	3. Chapter 3

The two were lying peacefully on the bed at the Fortress' master bedroom. Their little interlude having spilled out from the shower into the bedroom before getting quickly and passionately out of hand. He was laying with a hand stretched over his head and she was in the crook of his arm, snuggling into his broad shoulder.

On the surface, they looked like the perfect couple. But soon they would wake up, the innocence of two lovers in blissful slumber would fade to fantasy. What they shared together…it was their only vestige of serenity from everything that lay out there.

They had both taken to being lovers a few months ago. The world they created was so perfect, so peaceful. But what about themselves? What about _their_ world? When they're not out there? Having to constantly monitor and control the populace can wear one down, but they were both capable of much higher mental endurance than any other human.

He was the High Councillor, the leader of this perfect world. Where young, well-off families could go to theatres at night without the worry of being attacked by a gun-toting punk in an alley. She was the Queen of the Amazons; his other half in the chain of command. She was an extension of his own self, his equal. Whenever he made decisions, she would offer her input and he would accommodate her, and only her. Unlike all the others, she was way above being a subordinate.

Theoretically, they could complete each other, but such a reasoning alone cannot explain why they're together.

Indeed, it was an emotional need to relieve their self-inflicted loneliness that led to this evolution of their relationship. You could label the time they spent together as a distraction, a momentary suspension of duty. A selfish getaway. An _affair_.

But it was more than that.

When you're the High Councillor, you can practically choose any woman in this world to be your paramour. But a lot of people forget that behind that steely face there lies only a man. And while he can very easily share his bed, it was a drastically different thing when it came to sharing his heart and soul. While she was more than deserving of whatever trifling things he could give her, he had always believed that Diana was too good for him, too pure, too perfect…

But little did he know that she couldn't care less about her perfection. She couldn't care less about how the world perceived her if it meant being there for him. She tried to explain this attachment to the man lying beside her using mild and nice words such as empathy, mercy or compassion, and such words were true to an extent. That extent was when she realised that there was no more perfect explanation for it other than her love. She, yes, she _loved_ him to such an extent that she was willing to step off that 'perfect' pedestal and meet him on the way down. To her, being with him was perfect enough.

Diana was a perfect woman who would taint herself for him. She would blindly follow him to the deepest pits that there existed in Tartarus and any other version of Hell if he asked it of her. There was no other man in this world that she would gladly and readily give up her life for. And since he had already captured her heart and mind, her life was all she had left to give. She could only hope…and believe that she too was the keeper of all that he was.

After The Great Metropolis Disaster of five years ago, he showed her what he learnt was the truth. He showed her that Man's World was the self-destructive place that her mother taught her it was. He enlightened her to the reality that people only understood and responded to fear, and so fear was what they gave them.

Control. Order. Discipline. Peace.

It was possible because of the fear they had inflicted on people's minds. Hippolyta, bless her soul, would be proud of her achievements.

This wasn't Man's World anymore, it was _their_ world. They shaped it, cultivated it. It belonged to them. It was One.

Living as they were; the rulers of Earth, it was against their nature to show vulnerability. But what happens when you boil them down to man and woman? Strip away the titles, the uniforms and the authority. You'll find that she would be Diana, and he would be…exactly the same as he was before.

It was her who made the first move. It was her who approached him one night in the Fortress' monitor room and it was her who asked him if he felt things for her. Suffice to say, the High Councillor was taken aback. He admitted that she made him feel things that he'd only felt for one woman before. He didn't go into the specific of said feelings, but knowing they were there was enough for her.

She told him that she would like to try a relationship with him. Not as colleagues, but as man and woman. And he accepted. But how do you go about a relationship like this? Would they go out to dinner and try to get to know each other better? No, they were way past that fork in the road. Dates and dinners was what two strangers would do. Movies and park walks was what normal people do. They were not normal. And on the surface at least, they were not strangers.

Collegiately, they knew each other very well. They knew things like how would the other react to certain situation in battle, or in a mental exam. He knew how she would react if she was faced with a life or death situation, and that was to save him before anything else; he was sure of that since he would do the same thing. And she in turn knew his thought process every time he made a decision to exercise his rule. But that facet of their intimacy only came from years upon years of shared hardship and trial, not out of joy.

Happiness and Love; two things fleeting and rare in this life they had chosen. Of all the things they shared since resolving to create this perfect world, they never shared moments that would reveal what the other loved. Not unconditional or material love, like how one would love one's mother or how one would love a certain brand of chocolate. He had no idea for what or for whom she held the selfish, warm, crazy, heart-stopping, emotional and fuzzy type of love that you only see in movies and read in books.

It was what really made them unknown to each other.

Did he know what made her smile in the morning?

What made her heart skip a beat?

Did he know what made her cheeks warm with happiness?

Did he know who or what she thought of whenever the Fortress windows would display the stars?

No, he did not.

When it moved from matters of the mind to matters of the heart, _her heart,_ he knew very little.

And tragically enough, the answer to all questions was him.

Nothing more, and definitely nothing less.

By now, he knew how to pleasure her, how to make love to her, how to make her _feel_ loved. But he did not know that all she really wanted, all that would make her happy was for him to let go of this perfect world. Leave everything behind. Strip away all the layers until it was just them in a small cottage, having morning coffee as they stargazed into each other's eyes.

Despite all the time they spent in each other's arms, neither of them had actually said it. She would never admit it, but she was waiting for him to say it first. She would spend hours lying in his arms and inwardly practicing her reaction when he finally said it.

She would even dream it. He would look into her, and she would look into him, and they would say the three words that would make it all okay.

Doubt and apprehension forbade her from saying it first. What if he didn't feel the same? If he hadn't yet, she wanted him to come to that realisation all on his own, without any pressure from her. She wanted him to come to that conclusion like a peaceful forest glade would eventually arrive into the raging waterfall. That way, she would know that it was a decision that he made with his heart, and nothing else. They were both practically immortal, and she can wait a long time for him to admit to her those three words. She would gladly trade everything she had in exchange for those three words.

The irony was not lost on her. The Diana of five, six, seven years ago would've laughed at her and then straight after duly denounce the Diana of now for being so forlorn and lovesick over a mere man.

But that was five years ago, things have changed. Five years ago she was Wonder Woman; the Princess of the Amazons and the ultimate embodiment of female independence. And by no means was he a mere man. Metropolis or not.

She's still Wonder Woman. Still the feminist ideal and the embodiment of womanly perfection. He would say as much. But in reality she was the Queen and he the figurative King now, thereby independence from a misogynistic and patriarchal society meant absolutely fucking jack shit if the whole world already depended on you and took whatever you said as law.

If anything, he was the only living thing on this plane of existence she would depend on. She supposed it was needy of her, but she'd already given all of herself to him. And she hoped that she was the only one that he could depend on too.

They say that love makes you do crazy things. But if you've lived a life of all sorts of craziness, then love only makes you do things that make you feel normal.

And so she willingly entered this relationship with him in the hopes that he would realise how endearingly simple it was. She wanted him just to be a man, who would love her as a woman.

* * *

The stirring woke Diana up. "Kal?" she whispered in the low light, still heavy-lidded. "Come back to bed." she said sensually.

He was already dressed in his armour. "I have to go, I've been notified of a quadruple pardon in Metropolis." he said.

Diana got up. "A quadruple pardon?"

"Yes. A half hour ago." he confirmed seriously.

Diana's brows creased. It took direct and physical authorisation from either him or her for any citizen to be granted a pardon, let alone four. She was very sure she didn't go to Metropolis in the last hour. "Did you authorise it?" she asked.

"No..." The High Councillor tightened his jaw, "...but apparently I did. This is very serious, Diana."

Diana too changed into her armour, she too wanted to investigate this. "It could be a glitch." she suggested.

"Not likely. Signatures, DNA, and retina recognition all match perfectly as if I was there. It's too much of a coincidence."

He walked out of the master chamber, and she followed suit. "Are you sure you want to come? I could handle this myself." he stopped to ask her.

She stopped walking as he did. She turned to him and looked into his eyes, "Kal, wherever you are, I want to be there too."

He thought about what she said, and quickly smiled at her. But then his ears perked up to the magnetic hum of the teleporter and then an unfamiliar heartbeat. A heartbeat that wasn't Barry's, Hal's, Billy's nor any of the others'. It alarmed him how this heartbeat was unknown to him yet it seemed so in place.

"Let's go." he said.


	4. Chapter 4

Clark arrived at the Fortress. It was familiar, but at the same time it looked a lot more hostile. On the outside _his_ own Fortress was an ice monolith; modern, rather progressive and minimalist but nonetheless senile in design.

But this Fortress looked like a medieval ice castle with crystalline teeth. He spoke the Kryptonian phrase, and he found himself surprised when his body was enveloped in the blue teleportation field that would transport him inside.

He swivelled his head and looked around, trying to tell what differences lied on the inside. Listening for anyone he heard two heartbeats quickly approaching. Only one was familiar, he had memorised it a long time ago. Her heartbeat was one he would never fail to recognise.

He saw them, and they saw him. She was wearing a gold headpiece instead of the tiara, and her armour too was gold instead of the red and blue. It was more aggressive in design, but she had her sword in its usual place at her side, she was still and forever will be Wonder Woman.

He…he had the Kryptonian armour too, but it looked more menacing and overpowering. The insignia was black and red and there were large shoulder blades where the cape met the pentagonal shield. Gone was the joy associated in the blue and gold of his uniform, everything was darker and less hopeful.

Confusion ran through their collective minds before the High Councillor dashed to put his hand around Clark's throat.

"Who are you!" he gritted.

Clark forcefully shoved him off, losing all calm, "You know who I am!"

Kal got up, "You will answer me!"

It was then Clark felt his power sap out of him, he knew the feeling."Magic." he uttered to himself in distaste. Wonder Woman' lariat was wrapped about him, glowing as it subdued him to its coils.

"You are bound by the Lasso's coils. It burns away all deceit. Now, you will tell us who you are." she ordered.

Clark looked up at her and gave her the trademark lopsided smile as he ceased his struggles, the lasso reducing him to his true nature, "You were always good at tying me up in this."

Diana pulled tighter on her lasso, confident that if this imposter somehow had the power to resist it would soon be burnt away.

Clark grimaced as the High Councillor walked up to him, "I won't ask again. Who are you?"

Clark looked at his double in the eye, red and blue. "I am Clark Kent of Smallville, Kal-El of Krypton, and Superman of the planet Earth." He turned to the man's colleague, "Always nice to see you, Diana."

Diana gasped quietly, she felt the truth through the lasso she was holding. He looked like the Kal of ages ago. She never thought she would never see this again. There was the sea blue of his uniform that matched his eyes. The red that billowed like the colour of his own blood that he'd freely shed if it meant saving another life. There was the sea of gold around the insignia that always reminded her of the Sun that gave Kal his powers; as well as the same source that granted Gaea her light.

"This man is who he says he is." she whispered. It was _him._ Superman, Kal, Clark, it was all of him.

"Are you sure?" the High Councillor needed explicit confirmation.

"Yes."

Kal-El quickly moved to operate the teleporter. Clark and Diana were enveloped in the energy field and materialised in what looked like one of the Fortress' training rooms.

"You can let me go, I won't do anything." Clark said to Diana.

"You will only speak when spoken to." she rasped.

Clark smirked, "Jeez, even here you enjoy being bossy."

"Silence!" she asserted. Suddenly the whole room lit up red, and Clark felt the remainder of his strength reserves leak out. Diana eased the lasso on him when she was sure he was depowered enough but still kept it around him.

The High Councillor entered the room and walked up to Clark, "Tell me how you got here, and what have you done since then?"

His counterpart's voice was utterly serious, as if he was going to strike him down for any slight. "I don't know how I got here," Clark said, "but I only did what I had to do."

"You impersonated me in front of my officers." Kal said in a low growl. "Keep it around him, Diana."

"I can handle him." she assured.

"Your 'officers'? You mean that bunch of killers?" Clark shot back.

Kal grew angrier as he explained, "They're enforcers of justice and law, and you…I don't know where you came from but you're under my jurisdiction now, and you'll be subject to the same laws as anyone else."

"Enforcers of 'justice'…" Clark scoffed mockingly. "Your 'laws' are as judicial as a pile of bullshit."

"Keep it up and you might just get a fast track trial." Diana quipped threateningly.

"Ah, of course, have to keep the citizens in line, right? At all costs, including the the freedom of speech you and I valued." he said back.

Kal tensed at his counterpart's rhetoric. "And who are you to take this high road of yours?"

"You know the answer to that. Could you look me in the eye and say that those laws keep everyone safe?"

"I can, and I will. Those laws have kept the peace since they were passed, and they will continue to keep the peace so long as the likes of you are kept out of the picture."

"Kept out of the picture?!" Clark repeated incredulously. "Is that what you call murder?"

"The law is the law. And it will be enforced." The High Councillor asserted.

"Yes, apparently, which includes taking the lives of those you're meant to protect." Clark said snidely.

"Peace requires sacrifice." Diana stated.

Clark looked at her in the eye. "Yes, Diana, but that's not peace out there. That's _oppression_ and _fear_. You two of all people should know the difference."

Superman's anger reached a tipping point, and he backhanded his powerless counterpart into the hard floor, while a stone-faced Wonder Woman kept her hold tight on her lariat.

Clark was not surprised to find blood at the edge of his lips. Magic and red sun radiation had that effect on him, but he was surprised to find that his counterpart seemed to be immune to such weaknesses he deemed necessary for someone who had as much power as him.

"In case you're wondering, I've trained myself to process red sun radiation almost as efficiently as yellow. I'm immune to kryptonite too." the High Councillor explained.

Clark spat out the warm, salty blood on the floor. "Smart of you. Now you can murder who you want and get away with it with no fear of repercussions."

"What we do is necessary, you can take all the moral high ground you want but in the end the results speak for themselves! You have no right to judge!"

Clark fired back just as spiritedly, "And for some reason _you_ do?! You're supposed to be a symbol of hope! Not some goddamned dictator who calls himself 'leader' because you can take a bullet for a damsel in distress!"

"Is that what you still are in your world? A symbol?" Kal-El replied with a mocking tone.

Clark didn't know what happened in this universe's past. As far as he knew the man in front of him was just another product of a different universe to his. "I wonder what Lois thought of you? Maybe she's in prison for speaking out against your ideologies like any sane reporter. She is, isn't she?"

"You are not at liberty to ask about Ms. Lane." Kal-El replied.

Clark found something weird with that sentence, almost as if it was a pre-determined response. "Then allow me to guess; you had her locked up, didn't you? I know for a fact you were once in love with her."

For some reason, Clark could see that his words got a severely adverse reaction out of the High Councillor. The blood on his face seemed to have evaporated out into whiteness, and Diana herself was speechless. Clark realised that Lois must've had something to do with all of this. What else to explain the whitewash on both their faces?

"She's dead, isn't she?" Clark prompted in a whisper.

Through the power of the lasso, Diana found the strength to answer Clark, "She died because of him."

Shocked, Clark swallowed the lump in his throat. There was no wit or sarcasm anymore in his tone as he said, "Was it worth this so called 'peace' that you keep?"

With a silent tone, the High Councillor rasped, "Fuck you, whoever you are. You have no idea what I've gone through, and you've no right to tell me what I'm supposed to be. You'll be punished for impersonating a person of authority, so enjoy your last days."

Clark's expression was unwavering, "What about Lex? Or Bruce?" He knew that Bruce in any universe wouldn't stand for any of this. Lex as well, albeit for completely different reasons. He came to a sobering conclusion. "Did they 'enjoy their last days'?"

"That's enough!" Diana finally said.

"Find out where he's from, what his world is like, and how he may have gotten here, Wonder Woman. Don't hesitate to use any methods necessary, I'll be in Metropolis." Kal said to his more than capable second in command. If he spent any more time in a room with this disrespectful bastard he'd more than likely gut his throat before they could try him.

"Gladly." she agreed, even though what she wanted to do now was to sit Kal down and talk to him, to console him about the raw pain that so obviously flashed in his eyes when the bastard imposter mentioned his dead wife's name. Just now he looked like a ghost when the subject of her was brought up. They never talked about Lois. Ever.

She would have to bring it up later.

"I'll return shortly." With that the High Councillor blurred out of the training room, leaving the Queen of Themyscira alone with this shameless copy.

 **TO BE CONTINUED**


	5. Chapter 5

"You're only so fortunate that we do not choose to end you right now." Diana scathingly remarked.

They were in some sort of holding cell with him in front of her. Clark absently remembered the Fortress not having a room like this, but this one seemed to be well used.

Gone was any trace of mirth from his eyes, there was no trace of the kind of playfulness he had whenever he talked to the Diana of his world. This wasn't her. "What happened to the both of you? To everyone?" he implored. He was sitting subdued, looking up at her.

She steeled herself before she answered. "We saw the truth, something you shall experience in all its fullest."

"This isn't either of you." Clark replied, almost trying to appeal to her. "How long has this been going on, Diana?"

She found his tone unsettling, maybe because he used her name on a personal level, or maybe because if she'd have closed her eyes it could've easily been Kal speaking to her.

"It's Wonder Woman to you."

He kept at it. "Ten years? Fifteen? The Diana of my world is twenty-seven years old, and you don't look any older at all. I'm thirty myself. How long have you two been at this?"

Diana chose not to answer his questions, instead grabbing her end of the lariat and tightening the other end about him. She preferred that this did not have to be violent, but she was more than prepared for any eventualities. She couldn't predict how this man will react, even though something was telling her that she actually could.

"You don't need to use that on me. I'll tell you the truth."

Diana relaxed the knot a little. "We already know who you are, we've already established that you did not mean to be here." she stated.

Clark just stared dejectedly into her steely sapphire blue eyes, trying to look for anything other than tragedy. The way he looked at him further unsettled her, it's as if he was mourning the woman in front of him. Diana pressed on, "Tell me about _all_ the crimes about you committed."

"Well, if you really want to know; when I was a teenager, I came into contact with some red kryptonite…"

"On this world." Diana asserted. His preamble triggered a distant memory of years ago when Kal had told her how different forms of kryptonite had affected him once, but she forced the thought down. She must not associate this man with him.

Clark didn't say anything further.

"Well, aren't you going to talk?"

"I have not committed any crimes on this world." he stated as if he truly believed it.

"Are you sure? I would prefer you not to lie. You're charged as it is with impersonating Superman."

Clark gave a sad chuckle. "Diana, if you haven't noticed already, I am Superman."

"Not to me you're not." she retorted. "You are a felon, an outlaw, you released incarcerated individuals to the public using a fake identity."

Clark sighed before explaining, "I did what I did to try and save a family. These two kids committed an act in the hope that they'd be sent to the same prison as their parents, who incidentally were in there for the same thing."

"Why?" Wonder Woman pressed.

Clark eyed her with a passionately defiant expression, "Why? What the hell do you mean 'why'? It was the right thing to do! Or have you truly lost all sense of that in all this madness?"

Diana tightened the lasso around him once more. "That may be true in wherever you came from, but not here. It is one of the most serious crimes."

Anger flashed through Clark's eyes. "Really? How much more serious can it get if jaywalking nets you the gallows?"

The mocking in his tone struck a nerve. Her right fist flew out and it connected with his lower jaw. It was the first time in a long while that anyone had questioned her with such temerity and she wasn't having any of it.

"There's more where that came from. If I were you I'd choose my words from this point on." she threatened.

Clark felt the concussing vibrations transmit from her vambraces straight to his temple. He should've known that this Wonder Woman would've been stronger than the one he knew. Maybe there was a war of some sort.

Clark stumbled to get up, his expression almost crestfallen as he looked at her. Diana, despite everything, found it difficult to see this situation through.

"What else do you want to know?" was all Clark said after he righted himself, rubbing his jaw in the process.

She needed to find out about his world, and maybe piece together any clues on how he may have gotten here. "Tell me straight, what were you doing before you found yourself here?"

Clark was going to answer as honestly as he could, even though it was probably going to get him hit again. He didn't have a choice anyway with this darned rope around him. "I was drinking coffee." he answered flatly, and braced for the next hit.

"Excuse me?"

"Diana and I were on the late shift at the Tower, and I liked to have a cup of coffee whenever I finished. I was going to ask her if she wanted to share a conversation with me over some but for whatever reason I didn't, so I went home instead..."

* * *

 _He watched her walk in front of him as he opened the door for her. It was around this time that they would usually share a cordial 'see you later' or a quick 'bye' but he thought maybe it was time for a change. Suddenly his heartbeat shot up. He knew what he was going to say but he grew nervous when he repeated the words in his head. Finally deciding to go for broke, he spoke up._

" _Diana, would you like to…" He choked. It was like someone pressed mute. There must've been something in his pipes. Kryptonite, perhaps. Or damned Wally docking his throat at lightspeed, as he had been looking to get back at him for a while now._

 _Diana's eyes flashed beautifully in part amusement, part anticipation. She actually smiled expectantly as she said, "Yes, Kal? What is it?"_

 _This was hopeless, he thought, an utter failure on his part. "Err, nothing, I'll see you at our next shift together. Take care, Diana."_

 _A mildly disappointed Diana watched him leave through a nearby airlock - rather quickly at that too. She didn't see him for a while, and for some reason this incident would never be repeated again._

* * *

"… where I must have fallen asleep or passed out or something, because that's all I remember before finding myself here."

Wonder Woman felt as if she was in something surreal, the moment he described came back to her as if it was yesterday.

Clark felt something in the lasso, it was something other than the stern apathy that was there before, almost like a pulse of some sort, it was vague but it was there. His blue eyes watched her closely and realised the surge was from her.

"You know exactly what I'm talking about, don't you?" he asked softly.

She couldn't lie. "Yes. I remember."

Clark realised the implication of this, and smiled a genuine smile at his captor. It sent chills. "I guess I should've gone through with it, at least I wouldn't be here. Or at the very least she would be here with me."

Wonder Woman was shaken, his world appeared to be exactly the same as hers up to that point. This could've been his world too. Kal had gone home and asked Lois out when she'd suddenly called him asking for help on a last minute deadline. That was probably when the butterfly had flapped its wings.

"Why didn't you ask her?" Diana inquired, almost whispering.

"Ask who? Diana?" Clark thought about what he was going to say for a second. "I guess it was going to be too forward of me. I'd known her for years but I always thought she was a bit out of my league, truthfully."

It was the truth, he had always seen her as perfect and flawless, her little quirks serving only to augment everything great about her. It was a big reason why it was so jarring seeing this Diana like this. Clark quickly had to do his own compartmentalising. The woman he was talking was not the Diana he knew, but ever so slowly he saw the cracks filter through. He truly wondered what must have happened for her to embrace all this hate and oppression.

And due to his nature, a small part of him wondered if he could do anything to save her from what she had become, and him too.

His last statement clarified another thing to Diana. Their worlds were not the exact same, since at the shared moment he described she had only known Kal for months, not years. Maybe the time scale was different, but the events do align regardless.

She began, "You say that you had known your Wonder Woman for years. Does that mean that you belong in an established League?"

"Correct."

They would probably be looking for him as soon as they get any indication that something was wrong. That posed problems if they all somehow got through, seeing as Superman himself had already caused this much havoc. A whole League probably had the power to undo everything she and Kal had created.

Clark thought about the Justice League. They were all his closest allies and there was nothing he wouldn't give up to save even just one of them. Even Bruce. He thought back to her last question and came up with one himself, gambling that if the lasso was still capable of baring the truth he knew Diana would answer him.

"Diana, what happened to the Justice League?"

"Some have joined us, some have chose to rebel and go into hiding, and the rest are-"

"Dead?" he finished for her, even though he didn't want to believe it.

"They are remembered." Diana stated blankly.

This wasn't happening, Clark thought. It must be a horrible dream, but try as he might, he couldn't turn away or wake up from it. These people were his friends and colleagues, and to even imagine the thought put him in shock.

She watched his reaction silently, bringing back memories of the last time she had seen Kal like this. It was beyond horrifying to have seen him in such grief, and all those years ago she would have forsaken everything and everyone to relieve but a sliver of his pain.

Diana shut her eyes as she quickly tensed her jaw. It seemed that this man had the power to unlock what she and Kal had kept successfully repressed for all these years simply by being here.

Clark felt everything at his end, the emotions were as vague as before but with Diana he could read them like a book anyway.

He looked up at her, his cerulean eyes widening in concern, "What happened, Diana? Tell me, please." he said in a small, vulnerable voice.

She was going to tell him, she had no other choice. She never could say no to that voice.

The door to the room opened, and the High Councillor swiftly followed with a shocked looking Lantern and Speedster. Once again, the uniforms were drastically different. But Clark could tell from the heartbeats anyway.

"That's him?" Flash said.

"Yes." Kal answered. "You two are responsible for monitoring him. If he somehow causes trouble, it will be the last mistake I let you two make."

"Sir." Lantern replied dutifully. The Big Man's orders carried a chilling weight and the two wasted no time swiftly moving to cuff Clark and marshal him out of the room into a specially made Kryptonian-capable holding cell, leaving the High Councillor and the Queen alone.

"Did you find out anything of import, Diana?" he asked her with a softer voice once they had left. He trusted her unconditionally and didn't even bother to think about replaying the camera feed.

It was as if he had never left the room, Diana jarringly thought. "He is what he said he is, and his universe up to the point he had come here is mostly similar, sometimes identical."

Kal's eyebrows quickly furrowed in intense curiosity, "Explain, Diana." he said tersely.

"The timing may be different, but on the whole it seems that if there was no outside interference his fate and the fate of everything around him would've been the same as ours."

Kal instantly understood the meaning of all this, and he rubbed his temple in clear distress. "Rao…"

Diana went to him instantly in concern, putting her arms around him. "Are you alright?"

He looked away for a moment and then at her, and said with conviction. "I will be."

She wasn't convinced. She could read everything. Diana ran her sharp-nailed fingers through his hair and whispered, "Kal, let's go back to the room, please. I want to talk."

Kal thought about it but quickly moved away. "I can't right now, I have some things I need to take care of." He gave her a chaste kiss to the cheek. "Don't wait up for me."

He quickly zipped out of the room, leaving her to mull over everything that had happened today.

* * *

Bruce Wayne hunched over his panels, triple checking over the set of seemingly unintelligible data that came out of his latest experiment with what Lex called the 'time transistor'. In principle, it was like any other run-of-the-mill transistor. It would have a singular input and then from that a simple combination of outputs by using a split gate. The difference was that instead of electrical currents, it was powered by time itself. Bruce had provided the suitable location for this massive apparatus, whilst Lex's gargantuan offshore account had provided the equipment.

He knew that like any shrewd businessman Lex had an ulterior motive for a machine such as this, but he had no choice but to accept his offer of assistance. Wayne Industries and everything he owned had evaporated due to the fallout from Metropolis. Lexcorp barely survived using the chaos to somehow stay afloat, jacking up the premiums on their existing insurance policies; Bruce would never allow such a move and as such WI quickly went under.

Bruce sipped his coffee and looked over all the data once more. He wasn't ready to call it a write-off yet because it simply didn't make any bad sense enough to be useless. He should probably get on with something else instead, but it's not like he had anything else to do these days. There was no crime, no disorder, no need for a vanguard of the night like in the old days. But it was all wrong, everything was. It would take something much more fundamental than a caped crusader to change all this, hence the reason for this little project of theirs.


	6. Chapter 6

"He looks so much like him."

"Well, duh, hence the label 'imposter'."

"No, I mean that if they switched clothes, I wouldn't be able to tell."

Green Lantern looked at his best friend, and shook his head. "You can't be serious."

"No! Dude, tell me, what is it about him that would tell him apart from the Big Guy?"

Hal Jordan looked at the prisoner on the screen in front of him with a scrutinising eye. "Well, for one the Red wouldn't affect him if he was the real Superman."

"Really, that's it? If you recall it used to affect the boss too before he decided to work on it."

Jordan had to concede his friend's point. "Still, don't tell me that if the two of them lined up you wouldn't be able to tell."

"No, what I'm saying is that if I saw this guy five, seven years ago…I'd high-five him and call him 'Supes'."

Hal quickly made a worried face, and abruptly turned towards Flash. "Barry, this room is bugged, remember? I'd stop saying things like that if I were you. You have a family."

Barry let out a yielding sigh. "Yeah, no need to remind me."

"No, I don't. I'll let Billy's gravestone do that for you."

The darkness in his friend's tone shocked Flash. He was well aware of how things had changed, most of all himself. The things they'd done he believed were necessary and just, but now it was if he was just doing things to make sure he lived the next day. He couldn't even talk to anyone about it, as he had others he loved that would suffer if he was to get out of line. Things were certainly strange.

* * *

It was early in the morning and most everyone had gone home. The only noises were the whirring of the robots and all the devices automatically recording everything that there was to record. Diana was sitting on the main console, casting an ever watchful eye over what she was seeing, something that felt so familiar. She didn't know why she was up this late monitoring the world when the machines could've done just as good a job. It was just that everything she did seemed to trigger long-dormant memories, when she used to be so young…

* * *

" _Well, Lois and I have this like 'friend relationship' of some sort if you can call it that. She actually defined it very well the other day; my end was to make sure she was happy and her end was to allow me to make her happy."_

" _What?!" The nerve of the woman. She knew Kal to be kind of meek and accommodating in his other persona, but to think that someone he trusted like Lois would take advantage of him like that infuriated her._

 _Clark shrugged. "Exactly! I literally had nothing to say to that! I just nodded my head. She must've been joking but Lois is a terrible comedian, she can't have made that up."_

" _And you let her dictate things like this?" she replied, nonplussed._

 _Kal sighed, "It's part of the show, Diana. Superman is the strong one…and Clark, well…"_

" _Well what? Don't tell me that you act like a doormat as Clark all the time, because that would be a lie and I would hate for you to lie to me."_

 _Clark was slightly surprised by the passion in her voice, and he smiled at her to try and assure her it's okay. "No, no, that's not what I'm saying. How I act as Clark is defined by the people I'm around."_

" _Explain, Kal."_

 _The fire in her eyes was captivating to him. He actually sometimes liked to make her angry so that he could see her uber-competitive side flare up every now and again. It was another facet to her. "What I mean is; that around Lois, the Planet, all my work friends I might act as this unassuming, shy farmboy with no place in the big city. Around my parents I act like a son, around the League I of course have to be very professional and forthright…"_

" _And what about me, Kal? How do you act around me?" she interjected._

" _Ah. You're special, Diana, because I don't have to act around you."_

 _She was going to say something back, but didn't right away as she tried to understand the implication of his statement. However, as it always did the screen lit up red out of nowhere and alerted them to a huge accident in Europe._

 _Clark digested all the information on the screen and turned to her. "I think this is us, Diana. I'll take the airlock, see you down there."_

* * *

"Didn't I ask you not to wait up for me?"

That voice brought Diana out of her deep thought. She turned towards him with a drowsy smile, it was the early hours and he had only just gotten back.

"That wasn't an order, if I remember." she replied playfully as she crossed her legs in front of him.

Kal let out a quick laugh. He walked over to her and sat down on the next station over and by force of habit turned to the main screen.

There was a not too pleased expression to him as he asked, "Were you tracking me, Diana?"

She sat up and retorted defensively, "I was concerned, Kal. Is it such a bad thing if I wanted to know where you went?"

"You could've just asked me."

"Yes, I could've, but you were gone before I had a chance to even begin to think to ask you. So forgive me if it's a crime to want to know where you are."

Superman sighed. He _had_ neglected to consult her before leaving in a rush. But he's the High Councillor, it's not like it was the first time and definitely won't be the last.

"You said you wanted to talk, I'm here now." he reached for her hand, and caressed it with his own.

By now Diana knew that this was a way of trying to apologise. She closed her eyes and sighed deeply, whenever he did something like this it would have a never-failing effect on her. She clasped his hand tightly with her own, as if to draw strength.

"Are you still mourning her, Kal?"

Kal swallowed. This was the first time since ever that she had referred directly to his past wife in such a direct manner, if ever. It was an unspoken rule, but Diana was always so direct with him. He knew that she noticed his reaction earlier, which may be the reason she wants to talk about the past.

He clenched his jaw. "If you're asking that I still think about her; the answer would be yes, I do. It's very hard to forget."

Diana's chest tightened, as if she was afraid of that answer the whole time. Kal tried to reassure her, "But that doesn't mean I want her back."

She appreciated his honesty, but knew that she must also reciprocate with what she knew was true. "Kal, I want you to know that I'll do anything for you, but something I can never hope to do is to try and replace her."

"I know that, I never wanted you to. Nobody could ever replace you, either." he said as sincerely as he could.

Diana gazed at him, knowing he was telling the truth. She got up and let go of his hand. "I'm tired, I think I'll go retire for the night."

"Are you sure?" he asked abruptly as he got up with her.

"Yes, I'm sure." She put her hand on his chest and tiptoed up to kiss him lightly on the chin. "Good night, Kal. Don't be too long here, okay?"

"You have my word."

She smile wanly at him and turned away, she didn't look back as he watched her leave.

Superman watched her go through the door, watched her walk through the long and icy corridors and finally enter their chambers, which was coated with lead.

Diana's question about Lois got him thinking hard about what he lost. Lois was his wife and the father of his child, and Diana had to know that he could never possibly fully let go of the fact that they were ripped from him. Everything that had happened on that fateful day had cast such a precedent over the rest of his life. All of his actions were borne of the fact that all that he loved was taken from him. Diana had been by his side, helped him pick up the pieces, and she unconditionally loved whatever he could put back together of himself even when he deserved nothing,

Kal quickly dialed a familiar number on the Fortress main line, and the line went live in seconds.

"Superman, how may I be of service?"

"Lex, I need to schedule a meeting with you tomorrow."

Lex sounded like he just woke up, but Superman couldn't care less how he could've inconvenienced the man.

"Really, why not later today? You know I can always make time for a friend."

"Tomorrow at the usual time. Your office. I expect you to be there." Kal replied definitively before killing the connection, and leaving the monitor station to turn in for the night.

* * *

"Lex, what the hell?! It's goddamn five a.m.!"

"I have a fucking clock, thank you. We need to talk, right now."

The once great CEO known as Alexander Luthor let himself in Bruce's secret hideout, a location only the two men ever knew existed.

"This had better be important." Bruce grumbled.

"Okay, try this: we've been made."

"What?" replied a slightly disoriented Bruce.

"I said; **he knows**."

Bruce didn't fail to notice the emphasis on his voice. He was fully alert now. "How can you be sure?"

"He called me not even ten minutes ago to schedule a meeting with me tomorrow, and I damn well know that if someone like him calls like that then it's going to hit the fan."

Bruce wracked his brain. This cannot be possible. They had used every trick in the book to make sure that their project was ghosted. They even spent billions on a new supercomputer just to make up new encryption methods every hour. There was no way he could've found out…unless…

"What else did he say?" Bruce worriedly asked.

"Nothing, just that. He wanted to see me tomorrow and then hung up the phone. My suit isn't ready, Wayne."

Bruce looked away to the distance. It seemed his reckoning was going to come earlier than he thought. No matter, he has been preparing for this for a long time.

"We stick to what we set out to achieve, Lex. We destroy his greatest strength, and even a god can fall. I'll set up the contingency plans as soon as I can, he won't be able to trace you to me, that I promise you." Bruce said.

"That better be true, because I'll kill you before he gets the chance."

Bruce, to Lex's surprise, actually laughed. His threat reminded him of those old Westerns which would all end up in a Mexican stand-off, and somehow the hero gets to live. This time though, which one of them was the hero?

"You know threats don't work on me, right?"

"He's going to kill the both of us tomorrow if what you're planning doesn't work."

"Don't worry. He and I have history, remember? It's about time I stopped hiding and set the score straight."

* * *

Diana couldn't eat, couldn't drink, and sometimes she couldn't even think. She was in a whirlwind of worry. Bruce and J'onn had used the special reserve frequency for the first time to call all members of the league, available or otherwise, for an emergency meeting a few hours ago and she had been the first to arrive. That was in itself weird since it was usually Kal was already there when she arrived to these things. She thought nothing of it and simply assumed that he had been delayed momentarily delayed by something and he would take his usual place on the chair next to her as he always did soon enough.

The conference room soon filled to capacity though, and still there was no Superman next to her. That was when she began to get worried. The uncomfortable look on the normally placid Martian's face when she mouthed to him "Where's Superman?" further served to unsettle her nerves. And when Batman began the meeting despite the marked absence of the League's chairman, she knew something was wrong.

The agenda started with the fact that a missing persons report has been filed by Metropolis P.D. on a male with the name of Clark Kent. The notice was up on the screen in front of everyone to see, causing haunting murmurs to echo throughout the conference hall.

She couldn't even remember what she did after that. Questions. Has anyone done anything to contact him? Bruce explained that he and J'onn had tried every single medium available to reach him, with nothing to show for it.

She tried to digest the information, to work out a plan based on the facts, but even now her training and experience had left her. More questions.

Lois Lane had called Clark's apartment, wanting to ask him for some urgent help on an assignment. When he didn't answer after multiple rings, Lois as per her usual style decided to come over personally and barge in on him. She was sure he would be home, since what would Clark be doing on an off day anyway? As it turned out, he wasn't home. Lois was greeted with a mess of papers, dishevelled furniture and a general area of untidiness around a cup of coffee. A perplexed Lois left the scene.

Clark didn't turn up to work the day after that, and the day after that. It was as if he fell off the face of the Earth, and a frantically concerned (and slightly annoyed) Lois marched to the nearest police station, demanding that they get on his case immediately. The most famous journalist in Metropolis got her wish.

Diana turned on the news. One of the most respected writers on the Daily Planet's roster had disappeared without a trace and no one had a clue. They talked about it for a while before moving on to the next headline story.

It was much more than a headline to Diana. Her best, most trusted friend could be in some serious trouble and there was no one there with him. He had promised to her…no…he had sworn to her that he would never leave again like this. The gods knew that he had done so more than once.

"Where are you, Kal?" she whispered into nothing with a heavy heart.


	7. Chapter 7

Clark stared at his hands, at his wrists that had been bleeding pretty heavily the last few days thanks to these pair of kryptonite handcuffs they'd shackled to him. He was given his last meal yesterday straight after his trial and even then he wasn't allowed to have his hands free. Despite all the evident advancements in science, technology and the like, it all seemed archaic, this.

What were they going to write on his gravestone? He thought. He'd always imagined that he'd get to grow old and live out his last days on the farm, hopefully with someone there with him, but Smallville seemed so far removed from what's happening right now. Clark overheard some of the soldiers mentioning that kryptonite bullets were going to be used for the first time today, and given his current predicament not even being faster than a speeding bullet would save him this time.

"Any last words?" his esteemed counterpart asked.

"Go ahead." was all Clark said. A black, leaden cloth was placed over his head, and for a moment he felt so afraid of the looming darkness.

He waited and waited. Yet, there was nothing. Was this what it was like to die?

An electrical crackle erupted from the heavens, much like how the air around a lightning strike would instantly get charged. Clark felt as though he was going crazy with fear. Suddenly, he heard a loud noise, an in an instant he thought that was all she wrote, but then he heard the sound of people screaming in panic.

* * *

"Wayne, can you confirm what I'm seeing? I think my mind is playing tricks on me."

The earpiece suddenly crackled in the side of his head. Bruce was clad in his old armour, he chose this specific outfit to wear today for some poetic reason and it looked to have been a good choice. Batman was perched in the shadows and observing from a distance, just like old times. Unfolding in front of him was another public execution; a scene that he regretfully thought was familiar nowadays. Bruce had been powerless to save whoever was going to die every single time, but in this instance he needed to make everything count in lieu of a most recent discovery.

"Well I'll be damned, Lex, your transistor worked. We have to move quickly, he'll be wearing the blindfold in less than a minute."

"I guess your original plan is obsolete." Lex said.

"Agreed. You may have to declare your allegiance to me sooner that we planned."

"Copy. Orbital-4 is in position, ready to fire on your mark."

* * *

Clark could sense smoke. Not normal, fire smoke, but something much more unique. He knew exactly where this smoke came from, but for the life of him he just couldn't put his finger on it.

 _Wait a minute!_

This was one of the Batman's special concoctions, a cloaking device with lead nanoparticles that even he would have trouble seeing through. Suddenly he felt a white hot burning sensation on his wrists, and then a metal-clad glove slapping his face.

"That was my last pack of grenades. You have to get out of here, now!"

Clark could barely see, but thankfully all his other senses were fighting fit, he could hear the man's cardiac signature and it was most definitely Bruce Wayne. "And what the hell are you going to do?!" he shouted back.

"You'll never see me again so listen to me carefully, Luthor is waiting at the cave and you've got about ten minutes to get there before they catch him, so go!"

Clark didn't need to be told twice. He rose up out of the smoke into clearer air, but something stopped him from rocketing off to Gotham as he had been told. Green beams of energy were streaking down from the sky, impacting the arena floor and causing explosions to isolate those caught in the smokescreen. He was still Superman, did he really want to run away from all this?

He surmised that Bruce was planning something out of the chaos, and knew that whatever outcome it was it was likely that he wouldn't live through it. The lines had been drawn already and Clark couldn't allow that to happen.

* * *

Superman was dazed, he had been hit with what felt like a terminal missile and it had knocked him back a few yards. He couldn't see anything, but he did recognise the smoke and instantly realised who was behind this. He tried to blow most of it out but the coverage was unending. He tried to move but again and again he was hit, the massive force disorientating him and pinning him down amidst the explosions.

Clark had a hard time trying to see through the fog but together with his hearing he could make out where everyone was in a vague picture. He expected Bruce to go after Superman, but he saw him making his way for Wonder Woman instead and he dived back down after him.

"Curtains have been drawn. You've got about a minute before the satellite overheats, Wayne."

"Understood."

That was his cue. Bruce pulled out the special blade which hung from his belt as he moved like a scythe through the smoke and around the explosions. Wonder Woman's silhouette was clear as day in his cowl and it was all he needed to see as he locked in on her, making sure that he would use all the chaos he had been granted for one last action of defiance.

"This is for you…" Bruce muttered to no-one as he wound up his strong arm and took aim at her neck, exposed in the ceremonial garb she was wearing. The magical, poison-tipped blade needs only a slight, penetrating cut to guarantee her death.

* * *

Diana couldn't see through the smoke. It was as dense as the mist over the Styx and she feared the worst. Her first action was to look for Kal through the chaos but she might as well have been in the total dark, she tried to scream for him but the offensive fog caused her throat to seize. Whoever was behind this knew exactly what they were doing, she thought sourly.

Then she was hit by what felt like a hammer, knocking her to the floor. The blows came again and again and that was when the blackened veil lunged at her. She tried to reach for her sword, but she knew that she'd be a second too late. The hand and the blade were malevolently aimed at her neck. It was close enough to feel, but she felt a rush of wind and the venomous leading edge stopped but a hair's width from her skin. The evil instrument clattered harshly on the floor.

"Thanks, Kal." she whispered, knowing he would hear her, confident that in this situation he had done what she would've as well. What did she have to fear? Diana pulled her sword out and turned into her battle armour, ready to counterattack with him.

What she saw when she turned around froze her.

"It's you…" she gasped, vulnerable and immobilized.

It was definitely the Batman who had tried to strike at her, but she had already suspected that he had a hand in this anyway. What stopped her in her tracks was realising who had come back for her.

It was Superman indeed that had saved her, the Superman of old.

He gazed at her with that forlorn, innocent gaze to his blue eyes and for a second she thought that fate had played a cruel trick on her. A thousand years ago was the last thing she saw before she was blown back by an explosion.

* * *

"What did you do, you utter fool!?" Batman shouted in Clark's ear as he carried him away from the scene as fast as he could handle.

"Aren't you going to thank me for getting you out of there?"

"Put me down! Now!" he growled.

Clark could tell that he was not happy with him at all, so he did what he was told this time.

"You should have left!" They were at the gates of Bruce's dilapidated manor, which from the distance could be mistaken for a graveyard it was so run down.

"What, and leave you to die?"

"It was part of the plan! It damn well would've worked if you'd let me do what I was supposed to do. You ruined everything for what? So you could add another good deed to your list?" Bruce was irate, as if he had been robbed of everything.

"You wanted to kill her." Clark stated, not offended at all. "Was that really worth getting yourself killed in return?"

"I've been planning this for years, analysing their habits, watching their every move and waiting for the perfect opportunity to strike, and you come and ruin everything!"

"How can all this be any more ruined? You're telling me everything was normal before I got here?"

"It was a one-way mission. I was to use the chaos to kill her, and Lex was supposed to ambush Superman when she and I were both dead and he came looking for revenge." he explained.

Clark was taken aback. "That's it? What you've been planning for all these years with Luthor? A killing?"

Bruce wasn't having any of it, he had suffered way too much to be receiving judging looks from anyone, least of all him.

"Throw away everything you know about me, Clark, and listen to me, if you haven't figured it out already this world isn't exactly the same as yours."

"It still could be." Clark replied. "Especially if we all turn into maniacs hell bent on murdering each other."

Bruce shook his head in exasperation. This man wouldn't understand his motives. The main purpose of his life now was to avenge all that he had lost and he misguidedly had derailed that.

"Follow me. This is the first place they'll come looking for so we have to get out of sight." he said to Clark once he had calmed himself down. He knew was overreacting. Clark's unexpected appearance had thrown everything off balance but at the same time it wasn't exactly his fault he was here, but he had been setting this up for years, and probably will never have a chance to get that close again.

Clark followed Bruce into the bowels of the cave, making their way through a series of confusing tunnels and sub-tunnels in the complete dark. He never even knew that the place was this extensive. As expected, the entire place was lead-lined. Bruce was silent as he navigated his way through the darkness. Eventually the cave opened up to what looked like a large subterranean warehouse. There were huge lights mounted on the high ceilings and it all seemed to house this giant power generator in the middle.

"What is all this?" Clark asked, once Bruce had switched on the cave lights.

"This is what Lex and I have been working on since Metropolis fell."

"And where is your new friend?" Clark said with a little disdain.

"He's gone and saved his hide, as expected. His end of the deal was that he'd inherit control of Metropolis after everything was over."

"What happened to Metropolis?" Clark had suspected a great war of some kind, but really he knew nothing save for what he had already experienced.

Bruce chose to avoid his question for now. "Underneath us is the largest particle accelerator in the world, and it's all linked up to this machine." he explained.

Clark stared down at the floor. "Right under his nose. Impressive, so what's it for?"

"We used it to bring you here." Bruce replied flatly.

"Wait, so it's because of you that I find myself here?" Clark reacted indignantly.

"We never meant to do that specifically, it was all experimental and we only found out today that it actually worked."

"So you're telling me that I'm here because of an accident?"

"Not exactly; we knew what we wanted to achieve, just not how we were going to do it. But if you want to look at it that way, go ahead."

"And did you stop for a second to consider what I would've thought about it?"

"Not really." Bruce admitted. "But we didn't exactly have many options left. The resistance doesn't have a lot to turn to for help."

"The resistance?" Clark asked curiously.

"We're the only ones left opposing the regime, and we've been forced to go underground. Any hint of dissent and it's dangerous for any of us."

"Yeah, I've heard." Clark said wearily. "It doesn't make sense. Why all this? Why are you all at war with each other? You and I would devote our lives into killing out friends…why? I thought we had safeguards for this kind of thing."

Bruce hesitated for a moment. Clark was asking to relive what was hell for him. "Listen, Clark, we have enough time to try and send you on your way before Superman figures out that the manor isn't as empty as it looks." he said out of the blue.

Clark pondered his offer. Yes, it would be nice to leave all this and pretend it was all a bad dream, and it would be easy to make up a half-believable excuse for mostly everyone back home about where he went.

"Bruce, I want to know everything. I'm already here." Clark asserted.

Bruce sighed. "Honestly, I don't expect you to make any sense of what happened to all of us."

"Would you rather me try and guess?"

"The truth will hurt, Clark, but you were always stronger than the rest of us anyway. Follow me."

Clark followed him down another maze of caves, this time leading to an extremely fortified door. Clark didn't expect a quaint office with leather chairs and a bookshelf on the side. A portrait of Bruce's parents looked down on them, and Clark surmised this little room to be a vault, a chronicle, a chamber of Wayne family history.

"Sit down." Bruce said as he pulled out a book from the shelf. "Here."

Clark opened the book, not expecting it to be a photo album, much less a photo album of himself and none other than his colleague: Lois Lane.

"Lois and I…Superman got married?" Clark muttered incredulously after looking over a picture of them in front of the farm. She was wearing her wedding dress, and he was wearing an unusually well-fitted blue evening jacket. Lois looked beautiful, and the both of them looked happy as they looked into each other, their eyes so full of hope for the future.

"I was the best man." Bruce answered.

Clark turned another page. Jonathan and Martha Kent were there at the wedding too, Lois' parents and sister, Perry, everyone was joyful.

It was another turn of the page that opened Clark's eyes wide. "Was Lois pregnant?!"

"Yes." Bruce said grimly. "With twins."

Clark didn't know what to think. He looked at the both of them again, obviously in love with each other, ready to take on all the challenges that came with the life they had created for themselves. His heart sank as he realised that for some reason Lois wasn't here anymore.

"Bruce, where's Lois?" Clark said ominously.

"Clark, are you sure you want to hear this?" Bruce asked once more.

"I'm sure."

* * *

Superman was reeling from the assault. It all had classic Batman written all over it, but one thing he didn't expect was that Luthor would side with him. He had calculated that the two of them would've been too treacherous to spend any time in a room together without spontaneously slashing at their throats. That would've been convenient but he was focusing heavily on the information given to him by the hunter-killer teams he had sent out to look for the two that had escaped. Luthor was unreachable, but he'd get to him soon enough.

"Anything yet?" Diana asked him on the headset. She offered to personally investigate possible locations while he directed the assault. Right now she was at Smallville, scouring the farmlands if they somehow had the audacity to hide here.

"Nothing." he answered. "But it's not going to take long before I get results."

"They can't have gone far."

"I'll tell you when the teams update me on the situation." Superman said. His left fist swung around and punctured the body of another one of the Lexcorp satellites he had been systematically decommissioning for the past hour.

"That's fine. Are you sure you don't want me to help you out there?" Diana offered. The first thing he did after making sure she was fine was to shoot off into the upper atmosphere, taking out the first of many satellites with a barely checked rage.

"I'm making good progress." Superman affirmed. "I'll meet you back at the Fortress in an hour."

Diana heard him strain a little as he undoubtedly vented on some poor machine, and then an abrupt click to signify that it was all she'll hear from him in a while.

Kal had been acting distant lately, and of course Diana was concerned but she would give him his much needed space. By now she knew that Kal needed his own time as much as anything. However, she had some thinking of her own to do amongst the golden fields.

* * *

An hour later, Clark felt like he was about to drown. Bruce had told him everything from the first minute it had all unravelled. He felt the pain as if it was his own loss, his own tragedy. He was in denial at first until Bruce had shown him proof of everything.

How could it be? Superman's wife and unborn child were brutally murdered, by none other than him, and everyone and everything he knew and loved were destroyed by his hand also. yHis parents were in Metropolis visiting when everything was destroyed.

"I didn't know what Joker was capable of. If I had known…well, I wasn't prepared." Bruce offered.

The Joker, Clark sorrowfully though. He had given Superman a vision of his pregnant wife as Doomsday, led him to brutally take her life and in the process destroy the whole of Metropolis using a nuclear detonator linked to Lois' own heartbeat. This was too much to bear for any man.

"No, no. It wasn't your fault." Clark whispered as he ran his hand through his hair. "No wonder he was angry. I taunted him about her, you know? I thought I was being brave then."

Batman's own eyes softened at the sight of a man brought to his heels by a past that wasn't even his own, a past that had no relation to him.

Clark spied a portrait of a certain young sorceress on Bruce's desk. He feared the worst. "What about you, Bruce? What happened to you?"

This wasn't the time to hide anymore, Bruce thought. "Even though I felt his loss, I wasn't prepared to go as far as he did when it came to justice like Diana was. We all had a falling out."

"A falling out?"

"I resisted his new ideas, so did all my allies. Zatanna, Dick, Helena, Barbara…they sided with me, and all of them were killed fighting the regime. Queen too, and he's buried not far from here, Dinah has gone into hiding and even I don't know where she is."

"My God…what about Selina?"

Bruce's eyes dropped as he shook his head no. "J'onn impersonated me and faked my death. He's left Earth since."

"Who's left?"

"From your perspective? I'd say nothing's left."

Clark took it all in. What does anyone with power do when everything around him crumbles? God, it all seemed so rational now. The oppression, the control. He could see the method in all of it. This world's Superman has lost so much, and he couldn't honestly say that he would've reacted any differently if it all happened to him as well.

He put his head into his hands, trying to get the ghosts of Lois and everyone else out of his head, as they all came rushing back to him.

"We can still try and get you out of here before they find this place, Clark. I realise now that this was never your problem to fix. I can send you back to your world and you can make sure this never happens to you. I guess this experience has given you a little bit of hindsight."

"I can't just leave and let you die, Bruce."

Bruce's tone softened. "Listen, Clark, I probably will die but if it leads to you saving your own world, then it's okay. You owe nothing to anyone here."

"I never kept a ledger of those I help, Bruce." Clark replied candidly. "What happens now?"

"I guess I face my fate, and just let the pieces fall as they may."

* * *

 _Diana was cornered into the mouth of a shallow cave with no exits. Bloodthirsty monsters faced her down, eager to carve out her heart. She should've called for help when she had the chance but now no one would hear her in all this darkness. Wincing in pain she could barely lift her lacerated arm, much less hold up and swing her sword which now suddenly felt like the heaviest thing in the world._

 _She knew she was going to die, but she must fight nonetheless. Sometime somewhere eternal glory would await her…her compatriots said so when she marched with them in this land of gods and monsters._

 _Her shield arm went up first, unaware that the monsters would see this this as a sign of weakness. They encircled her like it was a simple drill, and for a moment she was afraid of what her friends would find when they finally discovered what was left of her…_

 _She closed her eyes for the second to last time and held up her trusty shield as high as she could. However, when she looked over the threshold there were no monsters. No evil. Just a man, his eyes cooling from red as he stood on the ashes of what would've ended her._

" _Forgive me, Diana, I'm sorry it took me this long."_

* * *

 _Diana had been pounding on the ice for months, with no avail. She had been unrelentingly carving out a channel through the cold firewall in the hope she'd get closer to what lay beyond. Every time her sword pierced the skin the Fortress would send a pulse that would send her back to where she started, and then rebuild itself. The cycle continued for months but Diana never gave up. She would do this for a thousand years if that's what it took to finally get to him, and then she'd do it again._

 _Eventually, the force field stood down and let her inside the cave. She soldiered on with little hesitation, but stopped when she entered the darkness that greeted her. This wasn't the Fortress of Solitude that she was used to. There was no illumination, and not a single trace of life. Perhaps this particular home really did house the soul of those that inhabited it._

" _Kal? Are you here?" she called out. There was no answer, just an echo._

 _Diana explored deeper. There were shards, splinters, shattered pieces of furniture that all made a gut-wrenching crunch as she walked over them. She decided to fly instead for fear of disturbing anything. But wasn't that why she was here in the first place? To disturb?_

" _Kal?" she called out again. She knew where the rooms were from when Kal had showed her his home for the first time. She remembered that he had wanted to show her what 'real snow' was like when she mentioned she wasn't a fan of it._

 _She floated silently up the stairs, to the master bedroom. She felt rude, invading his and Lois' privacy like this. But she had to reach out beyond what was worldly acceptable._

 _Diana called his name once more when she stepped inside, but he wasn't in sight. Where else could he be? Just then she thought she heard the beat of his heart. It came from a door which she thought was the wardrobe and she walked to it, now afraid of what she might see._

 _She opened the door, and gasped. It wasn't a walk-in wardrobe, nor a bathroom. It was a baby room. There were stars and moons on the ceiling, flowers and animals on the wall, and two identical cribs. Suddenly she felt terrible for being here. She shouldn't be anywhere near this place. This whole excursion had been a mistake._

* * *

"Diana!"

The piercing voice brought Diana back from her memories. They had been progressively stronger and real each time, so she just stopped trying to repress them, not expecting them to flow like sunlight when she did so.

"Yes, Kal?"

"What were you doing? I've been calling you." Kal sounded short-tempered.

"I guess there was some interference." she offered.

"Can you hear me clearly now?"

"Loud and clear."

"Good. We've found electromagnetic activity close to the Wayne Manor, I'm on the way now and I expect to need your help." He ordered, "Bring your best sword."

There was a chilling tone to his voice, but she understood the necessities of everything they did. "Okay, I'll meet you there."

* * *

Clark watched Bruce push a series of buttons and dials. The ground beneath them rumbled as the time transistor crackled to life. He could feel the air buzz and it was almost deafening.

"Fifty percent!" Bruce called out to him.

Bon Jovi rang around in his head. This was going to be over in a short while, but he couldn't stop thinking about Superman, Wonder Woman, and of course the man in front of him. They could still be saved, said a voice in his head.

"Fifty-two!"

Clark grit his teeth. Bruce was offering him the opportunity to save his world from this, at the same time condemning this one to its own fate.

Did he really want to run away from all this?

Bruce looked over the data feed. Everything looked good, and by that, everything looked unintelligible just like the last time. He could inadvertently send him to Renaissance France, but even that would be better than the world of today. Clark would probably even enjoy himself.

Suddenly the alarms started ringing, and his first reaction was to turn the machine off. The alarm had nothing to do with the machine, however.

"Is that bad?" Clark chimed.

"Yes."

Bruce sprang into action, taking the shortcut to the elevator that would take him into the level below. Clark followed him, and stopped when Bruce locked the elevator doors behind him.

"Stay here, Clark, and I mean it this time! When that power gauge reaches ninety you should be home safe."

Clark watched him disappear down, and turned to the machine in front of him. He hadn't given Bruce any indication but he knew exactly how the transistor was supposed to work. It was an RNG machine, a random number generator, and he surmised that the threads of fate were tied to an exact number. The machine hoped to manipulate such numbers.

Except that was all impossible without being some time lord, and no amount of science could achieve that, Clark was confident because not even Krypton could and they were under a lot more pressure. What Bruce and Lex had created was a machine that could transport atoms between strictly parallel universes by simply ripping through them with a particle accelerator.

He eyed the sensor feed of two contacts at high speed inbound for them, and hoping for the best, deftly pushed the same buttons and dials that Bruce did.


	8. Chapter 8

Superman and his second-in-command landed on the formally grand front lawn of the Wayne Manor. The pavé driveway cracked and buckled under his boots. He wasn't in a very accommodating mood.

"Where do we begin?" Wonder Woman asked. She was clad in her best fighting attire; resplendent in her impenetrable golden armour, shield, lasso and the millennia-old war helmet she had inherited from her mother. Hephaestus' venerable sword was by her side at the ready.

"I had sentries set up here to make sure it's all inhabited." Superman looked at the crumbling walls and the overgrown fascia of the mansion. "He must've found a way to shield himself from them."

"Didn't Lexcorp run one of the military contractors?" Diana insinuated.

"Yes." Kal replied heavily. "He's unreachable right now but I'll deal with him soon enough, you have my word."

Diana began scathingly, "Rodents will hide in their caves."

"Agreed." Kal's rose up into the air and hammered down in a straight dive at the ground beneath them. The earth shook and quaked under Diana's feet as he took the most direct path to where the energy was detected from. He opened up a huge crater on floor, the earth being swallowed by the chasm Superman drilled into the rocks. Diana followed him, making her own way through the shattered dirt. Kal was never trifling when it came to the use of his power. Anyone who gets in his way on this day will die, that she knew for sure.

* * *

Bruce was almost done with the security override on Lex's prototype suit. As much as it hurt his pride, he knew he was going to need all the help he can get if he was to buy time for Clark to escape. The suit itself was powered by an extremely unstable and radioactive isotope of green Kryptonite they had synthesised for the express purpose of bringing down the invincible after his closest was taken from him. The risks to Bruce were quite great, it could even give him incurable cancer if he wore this thing for any length of time, but then he would deserve such a fate after this.

It was then that he felt the bunker sway, then a constant pounding afterwards over his head that was almost deafening. Bruce knew exactly who was knocking on the door. This suit was only specified to barely deal with one metahuman at a time, any more gruelling than that and it's simply not going to work out well for him.

Bruce hoped that Clark would be home safe by now, free to use whatever he learnt to prevent this from all happening. The rest of his existence now was to make sure that the time transistor was destroyed, and everyone who was responsible for this world stayed here to live through it.

* * *

Clark, like many times before simply hoped for the best. He typed what he thought made the most sense and pressed the green button to initiate everything, and once he saw what greeted him on the screen he had never hated progress bars in his entire life like he did now. The process would take time, longer than it would've if he simply let it continue the last time and bailed out of here.

He tried to look through the cave ceiling, forgetting that it was all lined with lead. He swore to himself, knowing that he would never be able to see them coming but at the same time knowing that they were almost here. Clark prepared himself for what was going to be the fight of his life so far. Superman, that other Superman was most definitely stronger than him; and even his universe's Diana was lethal enough as it is. She would certainly even things up if she was here, Clark thought, but he then swiftly decided against the notion.

If she was to get hurt result of that, he would never live with himself. It was much more attractive proposition to make a stand by his lonesome and possibly die rather than his best friend die in expense of him.

Suddenly the bursting charge that was an angered Superman punctured through the roof of the bunker, followed by Wonder Woman and then the earth that they had displaced. The whole roof seemed to cave in after them. Perhaps even more worryingly was that the both of them didn't look to have broken a single sweat tearing through the ground like that.

"Crap." Clark found the time to utter before Superman came careening into him. He barely found time to face away from the machinery lest the momentum take them ripping through the whole thing. His counterpart attacked with vicious speed, and he was soon taking multiple hits all over before he had a chance to even hit back.

He felt the punches, the kicks and put his forearms up in defence. The attacks did not stop though, so Clark wound up his strength and threw a punch of his own amidst everything, hitting his counterpart straight in the jaw and knocking him back.

That seemed to have taken Superman by surprise that he still had the capacity to hit back even after the full out pounding he had given him.

"You'll pay for that." he scowled.

"I'd like to get my money's worth then," was Clark's huffed out reply as he wiped blood off his nose, getting up and asking for more.

Superman recognised as much, and set out to attack him again. Clark was more prepared this time, but it didn't make a difference as the fury of Krypton struck him again and again. His body was working overtime to repair the damage, but his enemy simply worked faster at pummeling him.

Superman eventually got the leverage he needed. He grabbed Clark by the collar, raising him up a few feet then throwing him down at the ground, He then pinned him with his knees and drilled punches into his ribcage with his fists and his elbows, not stopping even when his own muscles protested .

His hands blurred as he proceeded to exhaust his energy reserves in the most violent way. His knuckles were bruising as the man underneath him strained for life itself.

He grabbed at his collar and pulled his head close, smelling the blood leaking out from his mouth. "Had enough?" he rasped.

Clark couldn't breathe. He was certain most of his ribs were tenderised and his lungs were perforated, the pain was excruciating as he tried to answer back at his attacker. He couldn't muster up a word, so he did his second best and coughed up a lungful of blood at him.

That enraged him even more. He was going to kill this man here and now.

"Kal!"

* * *

Diana watched Kal do his job. He had gotten very good at it, and her pride was more than ready to admit that he was definitely deadlier than her. She watched him as he beat the life out of the man who not very long ago had protected her. A part of her screamed out it was wrong, but she'd had plenty of time getting used to tuning out that particular voice.

With her eyes, she could see everything unfolding even when the two of them moved at a speed that was almost invisible. She could hear the crunch of the man's bones, the frantic flow of his blood as Kal lay into him relentlessly. This she could not tune out, especially as both of their heartbeats were the same. Even when she closed her eyes she could entirely determine the extent of the damage he was receiving, and for what?

He broke the law. He must be punished.

However, Diana knew by now that the Kal of five years ago would've behaved the same way if the shoe had been on the other foot. It flat out haunted her to see him die like this.

The ground quaked underneath them. She attributed that to Kal's power but then the machine adjacent to her began to whir and beep furiously, worryingly so, and she could sense it give off a most unsettling energy.

"Kal!" she alerted.

He stopped what he was doing instantly and turned to her, able to hear everything she'd say.

"Wonder Woman?"

"This…thing!" she didn't know what it was.

Kal put the man down, and blurred straight over to it. Reading everything, he couldn't as yet ascertain what it was for, so he dragged his victim over.

"What is this? Answer me!"

Diana flew over in an instant to wrap the lariat around him, but not before he got out his own words.

"Enjoy the trip." Clark managed to gasp out.

The three of them were enveloped in a blue mist, swirling around them and immobilising them as the transistor pierced through the universes, only to stop when it reached the destination it had been programmed to.

Eventually, everything settled down to reveal golden fields, the sun high in the sky and not a single cloud in sight. The light was almost blinding.

Diana was the first to speak. "Kal? Where is this?" Kal was next to her, and Clark was prone on the ground.

"I know…I know exactly where this is." Kal whispered to her. He instantly moved to Clark, bending down to him. The bright summer sun was healing his injuries by the second.

"Why did you bring us here?" Kal asked, giving him some reprieve.

Clark managed to get up on his knees, clutching at his ribs and coughing profusely as his body repaired the damage.

"Have a look inside."

The red farmhouse was some distance away, but that didn't matter to Superman's eyes. His vision made short work of the insulation and wallpaper that adorned the rustic red house.

He could see two children. They both looked alike. Same jet black and wavy hair, same cerulean eyes. They couldn't be any older than five years old.

"What is this?" said a shocked Superman. "What have you done?!"

"We're in an alternate universe, Clark. This is all real." he said.

He looked at him, but he was unable to tear his eyes for very long from the two children in that farmhouse. They were so beautiful, the boy wore a plaid shirt and some old looking jeans, and the girl wore a yellow summer dress that brought out her eyes and matched the sunflower in her hair. They were in the kitchen, patiently waiting at the table for their lunch.

Their mother looked…well, _almost_ comfortable in an apron and puffy oven mitts. The children looked happy at the sight of the (ready-made) pizza steaming out of the oven.

Clark, despite himself, chuckled upon seeing it. "I guess Lois never learnt how to actually cook."

Superman was close to breaking as he watched the three of them interact. It was exactly as he had envisioned it. "Why? Why would you? I lost her! I lost them!" he shouted, falling on his knees.

"I know." Clark replied, no malice in his voice and finally getting on his feet. "I know it was hard. I know you loved them. But the most important thing you lost on that day was yourself. You've never let go, and the peace you have is as tenuous and volatile as the people you see in front of you.

Superman's tears fell this time. "You're a bastard! You don't know what it was like!"

"What kind of abhorring man are you to resurrect and flaunt someone's ghosts?" Diana accused, impassioned.

"You are their ghosts as much as they are yours." Clark retorted. "Tell me, do you think they would've appreciated knowing how much of a tyrant their father is?"

"My family…everyone I loved along with millions of others perished because of me!" Superman began angrily. "Do you know what it was like to be the sole reason for that?"

Diana instantly consoled him, "Kal, it wasn't your fault. You know it wasn't."

"But it was, Diana!" he rebutted. "Everything I've done since then…"

He was cut off by the electric blue mist that again enveloped their environs, and they all expected to be transported back.

However when it settled, they weren't at some cave. They were at the same exact place in the world, in the same patch of field and under the same skies. It was if they never left and nothing had happened.

Clark didn't know what was happening. Initially he had thought that Bruce had caught wind of his machination and had tried to bring them back as he expected him to. He never planned to come here again. The thought that the transistor could've malfunctioned worried him, as it was imperative that they all came back and it was destroyed, never to again be used.

"Now what?" Superman demanded.

There was a confused look in Clark's eyes, and he looked over at the farmhouse. His expression changed from bemusement to extreme shock once he registered what he was seeing. He looked back and forth at his counterpart and at Diana repeatedly, his eyes as incredulous as they'd ever been as they confirmed all his suspicions.

Superman followed his eyes, and duly his reaction.

The two beautiful twin children weren't in the dining room patiently waiting for their dinner; rather, they were in the back yard playing with their mother. They wore the same clothes as before, however with the addition of a cute, Spartan-red cape for the both of them.

The girl tossed a ball into the air, and the boy flew after it. However, their mother flew after the ball too, and caught it before the boy did. Laughing, she playfully taunted her son, letting him chase her over the farmhouse before allowing herself to be eagerly caught, but not before throwing the ball back at her daughter. The boy laughed at his mom' tactics and then zoomed after his sister.

Diana watched the scene too, with rapt attention. The two children unmistakeably still had their father's open blue eyes, but they'd inherited their mother's features and olive tone. Surprisingly, the girl sported her grandmother's golden, braided hair. Diana was witness to the little princess' innocence and grace as she tried to speed from her brother amongst the tall grass and the sunflowers. She was caught however, but she chased back after him laughing. He wasn't looking at where he was going and the two of them went tumbling into their mother's waiting arms.

Diana wouldn't have a clue what their names were but they were so beautiful, their faces so life-like and their smiles so radiant that she almost wanted to reach out and call to them, to touch them.

Before she could though, the air around them crackled and buzzed. She tried to fly towards them buts she was ripped from what she was seeing as time once again extended its clutches around them. In a matter of seconds they were back at the cave, deposited in the same patch of floor from where they had left.

"This thing isn't a tourist attraction, Clark." Bruce Wayne's gruff voice greeted them, but somewhat mechanical sounding.

Clark looked up at the source of the sound. It was Bruce as he had never seen him before. He was wearing what looked to be a mechanically augmented suit. On the chestpiece was a glowing green core, and upon closer inspection it was definitely some sort of Kryptonite-enhanced power suit.

Superman had reached the same conclusions.

"Give it your best shot, Batman." he taunted with prejudice, intentionally exposing himself. "Haven't you figured it out already? I'm-"

Bruce wasn't taking any chances. He instantly fired off a projectile blast, which hit Superman square in the midsection.

Superman tumbled and fell, blown back by the collision with the projectile. It was painful, extremely painful. It was like being hit with a train. He spit out blood, and as he clutched at his stomach he was aghast to see his own blood on his hands.

"How?!" he spat.

"Isotope. Don't try and resist it, Kent, it might be less painful that way." Bruce answered behind his cowl. He followed up his words with another salvo from his heavily-armed suit, but this time the whole shot was deflected by Wonder Woman.

She went to him, in a furore of concern as she saw the extent of his injuries. "Kal? Oh, gods! You're bleeding!"

"Yeah," he panted. "Give me cover for a second."

She put her vambraces up whilst Superman looked down at his open wound. Blood was flowing and it looked ghastly. He felt his strength slowly dwindle as the poison attacked his immune system, Bewilderingly to Diana, he brought his cape to his mouth and bit at the bunched material. His hands moved at speed to forage and pluck at the round inside him, and on pure adrenaline he used his eyes to sear a white hot blast at his own wound, screaming into his cape for all it was worth.

"Hera, Kal, what are you doing!?" Diana shouted. Superman ignored the noise, focusing on psychologically berating his pain receptors.

As painful as it was, his emergency cauterising worked well enough and he stood up under his own steam, his body already working to heal the damage. Immediately he had Batman locked in his sights, and he fired off another blast of heat vision at him before the suit could reload.

Bruce would never have the time to dodge. Lex, in his infinite wisdom built this rig on the assumption that Superman would be crippled on the first shot, finished off by the second or third and that would be that.

However, the full blast was absorbed by a timely Clark, who instantly weakened in close proximity to the suit.

"Clark, get the hell out of here whilst you still can, go!" Bruce implored, seeing him in a weakened state.

"There's hope, Bruce." he whispered weakly.

"I don't care! There won't be anything in two minutes!" He spotted Superman and Wonder Woman on the warpath. "Shit!"

Clark at no small cost moved to push him out of the way, barely avoiding Diana's sword in the process. They came hurtling into a wall and he dropped out of the air instantly, feeling drained and nauseous.

"Clark, you've saved me enough. Please, go." Bruce repeated sincerely.

Clark was unable to answer as he was coughing his lungs out, again. Bruce knew he needed to get as far away as possible from him, as the Kryptonite exposure was taking him to pieces. He signalled for a trap door and escaped behind it just before it was destroyed by another heat blast.

Superman and Wonder Woman came to stand over a recovering Clark. Diana instantly pointed her sword menacingly close to his neck.

"Where did he go?" she demanded.

"I honestly don't know."

She brought the sword closer. "I won't ask again."

Superman scanned the walls to no avail. "I'll go after him." he said. Diana was going to bring something up but he stopped her. "We have unfinished business. Try not to kill him." he asked of her regarding Clark. "I need to get some answers." He proceeded to crash through the walls, cratering the whole cave system in his search.

Wonder Woman hurled the lasso at Clark, and to her surprise he still had the energy to roll away and defy everything. She flew and tackled him, sending the two of them crashing into a metal wall with him taking the full brunt.

Clark once again pushed off of her, feeling some of his energy return. He saw a punch coming, and successfully blocked it with a forearm. Next coming up was her sword, and using his speed he sidestepped it.

Diana was not discouraged though, he wasn't attacking at all and it was only a matter of time before she finally connected, and she did with a horizontal slash to his chest.

Clark drew back and assessed the damage. The wound stung but it was only a cut. However, he doubted he'd be this lucky next time.

He decided to be proactive. He used an energy sapping burst of speed to come straight at her, colliding and then pinning, but not crushing her against a wall. With all the strength he can muster he held her wrists above her, and blocked her from moving by pressing up against her.

Diana felt him assert himself, and with a growl she tried to wriggle out of his grasp.

"Stop, Diana." she heard him say, and she was compelled to.

He was very close, and he was looking straight into her eyes with that same expression on his face, not saying anything. He just looked at her.

"Are you going to kill me now?" The Amazon said.

Clark shook his slowly to say no. "You know I can never hurt you, even when you're like this."

"You're a coward." she spat, not moving and staring him down, refusing to acknowledge his presence.

Clark narrowed his eyes, not least offended but wanting to make a point. He relaxed his grip on her but remained close. "Are _you_ going to kill me?" he asked, with his eyes as open as they'd ever been.

Diana hesitated. She closed her eyes and breathed out a long breath. The man in front of her was not the same as the one she loved. To kill him however, would be to rip away the heart of a sister somewhere whom she knew for sure would be praying for his return.

"No. I can't either."


	9. Chapter 9

"No, I can't either."

Her admission truly shocked him. He had his brave face on, but Clark had this nagging feeling that even she was too far gone, that any second now he would feel the cold leading edge of her blade piercing through his ribcage. All it took was a glance at her fiery sapphire eyes to give Clark a sense of renewed resolve. He drew back and let go of her, he didn't break his gaze on her though, as if he didn't believe her and was just staying alert for anything. There was a reluctant look in his eyes as he asked, "You saw them, didn't you? Those children."

"How could I not?" she accused.

Diana thought back to what was on that farmstead, it had been like a sceptre lingering at the forefront of her mind since then.

"I never intended to discover that, to find them. It was just…there. The machine took us there because that was what it found when I told it to search for what his life could've been. I had no idea." Clark explained.

"Of course you didn't." her tone was dipped in cynicism. "I am not unfamiliar to tricks on the mind."

Clark's cerulean blue eyes darkened, "You thought that was a trick, Diana?! You think I could ever imagine something so raw…so beautiful, and then bring it to life with some stupid machine that I didn't even make?!" Clark fiercely countered. "Everything you saw was not my making, only you and he could've brought anything like that to life…"

Diana gritted her teeth and stopped him from saying any more. She knew what she saw. "Not another word! What he could've had has nothing to do with me! He was married to Lois: the love of his life, and his…" she hesitated, "…their future was taken from him, how much more does that need explaining to you!?"

Clark detected the denial from her voice.

"Lois was there, sure, but there was obviously something else. And how could you say his one and only future was ripped from him? You're telling me that him being with you is just a means to an end, something just to fill the void? Some sort of consolation prize? You'd be lying to yourself!"

"How am I supposed to believe that everything was real?" Diana retorted. The scene she saw felt so true, so _attainable_ , that it was hard for her to accept that it wasn't.

Clark confidently pressed on though, "The machine works, Diana. How else would I be here?"

She was still combative to him, and everything he represented. "Be that as it may, it's a waste of time to dwell on what could've been."

Clark was resolute. "I saw hope, Diana. It's never a waste of time to act upon hope. I didn't see what could've been, nor did I see what was lost. That was more than just kids on a farm. I refuse to believe that you or he are so incapable of change…and not for a second do I think that you two have completely lost the capability to create a world like that; and if you truly love him, neither would you."

Diana screamed out at him, pushing him away. She held her own face in her hands as she turned away from him, refusing to show him just how much she wished his words to be true. The hope…and happiness he talked of was supposed to have been the bygone dreams of a time long past. They were just making the best of what they had. It was useless to even strive for something better, especially when Fate had tried its hardest to teach them that it was dangerous to even think of trying to reach it.

Clark stepped a little closer, sensitive to what she was feeling. He knew she was scared of it all, scared of having what was her heart's desire, and she was trying to beat the whole thing down.

"You need to leave. There will not be a place in this world for someone like you." Diana finally said after a while before he could get the chance to speak.

Clark sighed deeply. Bruce's machine was at the ready and not far away from them, and it would take much less effort for him to leave all this than if he were to stay.

"I know that. But if there's a trick to being a Superman, it's that you should always leave a place in better shape than when you found it." Clark said politely. Diana turned to look at him bemusedly, but he just smiled benignly at her.

"Leave, now." she reiterated. "I'll have to watch you die if you don't." There was no threat in her voice anymore like there had been before, she was just stating and accepting the reality of the situation.

"That is a possibility." Clark conceded lightly. "But I have to at least try, Diana." he said seriously.

"He'll kill you, even if I won't." Diana warned again.

"I'll try my hardest to bring him back before that happens, I promise you, even if it does get me killed in the end." With that, Clark flew off at speed into the hole that Superman had drilled through the bunker, hoping to find Bruce, and Superman, before it was too late.

* * *

Bruce Wayne cursed his living existence. All his life he had been fighting beings, individuals and even entities and ideologies much more powerful than he was. Back then though, he almost always had the advantage that most of his enemies were all in fear of him. This time it was different. Years of working and fighting together and against each other in close proximity meant that Superman knew the way he thought, the way he operated, the way he liked to breathe even.

"I can smell you, Bruce!" echoed the voice of his predator.

Bruce had ditched Lex's suit a long time ago, salvaging what Kryptonite he could rip from it and was just in his usual Bat-attire. He could move in the shadows easier this way, which would of course come in handy if his enemy didn't have to ability to see in the dark. Only the lead-lined construction of the bunker was saving him by now.

Bruce tried to move as silently as he could, his senses over-sensitive to his surroundings to anything that may indicate trouble. Despite all his training and experience though, it was his very humanity that failed him. His heart was beating at a couple hundred times per minute, and Superman used it as a homing beacon to him.

The walls around Batman shook, and before he could react rock hard fists broke and ripped apart his armour in a split second, he tried to reach for the Kryptonite in the special compartment on his belt but he was one second too slow.

"Not that trick again, Bruce."

Superman caught his hand, and squeezed. Bruce's inhuman scream echoed violently throughout the cave.

Clark heard the scream, and rushed to where he thought it came from. He broke through rock and tried to get there as fast as he can, the echoes however meant that he was misguided. When he eventually arrived to a faraway pile of black armour and a shattered cowl, he realised that he had failed to save his friend.

Superman dragged an unconscious Bruce back to the main area where Wonder Woman was waiting, depositing his captive on the floor.

"Where is he?" he asked her.

"He, he escaped." was all that Diana could muster.

"Unbelievable." He was angry, but he remembered how resilient his old self was and held off on further frustration. "No matter. I'll chase him to wherever haven he thinks he's in, and he'll die with those he claims to be able to protect."

Bruce, who was finally awake, heard her and chuckled triumphantly at the news. "Finally, that stubborn bastard!"

"Secure him." Kal instantly ordered. He was displeased that the accomplice had gotten away, but his jurisdiction extended throughout all of Earth, even the ones not on the same universe as his. He'd bring him to justice.

Superman bent down to him. "Thanks to you, Bruce, I have a means of pursuing him. You will agree to brief me on this contraption of yours, and I'll make sure your end is swift."

"Go fuck yourself."

Superman stamped his foot on the hand that he'd just crushed earlier, and Bruce screamed to the point of almost dying. His only consolation was that Wonder Woman's lasso was now wrapped around him, withering away his resistance.

"Whether or not you tell me where your friend went, Bruce, there's no end to the measures I will take to find him, so you might as well tell me now and make the process as painless as possible for everyone involved." Superman's voice was cold, unerring, and utterly inflectionless.

"Prime!" Bruce screamed, his mind unable to resist the magic.

"What was that?"

"You'll never win, Kent!" Bruce spat. "Come after him, and he'll fight you, along with those that love him! You'll never win!"

Superman's eyes glowed a fiery red, a massive burst of heat almost coming out of them but he stopped an inch short of incinerating Bruce. "You do not deserve a true warrior's funeral." he said venomously. He turned to Wonder Woman, and said to her gravely, "Your sword, Diana."

Diana reached for her scabbard, unsheathed her sword and handed it hilt-first to him. Kal regarded the venerable weapon with respect. This one weapon in her hands has almost drawn as much blood as he did.

"Kneel." Superman ordered coldly, adjusting to the sword's deadly weight.

"Never!" Bruce was as defiant as ever.

"Wonder Woman, help him to his knees."

Diana stood behind him, pressed her knees to his back and dragged him upright by his hair. Bruce had been a trusted ally and close friend to her at some point in her life, now she was going to see to the end of his.

Suddenly the rock behind them burst, and Clark came crashing into Superman before he could execute the blow. They tumbled to the floor in a heap, the sword clattering on the floor as they engaged in a death-wrestle. Superman attained the leverage first, and swung a punch at Clark's face. He avoided it by an inch, and kicked up, freeing himself and standing again.

"I'll kill you this time!" swore Superman.

"Listen to me, you have to stop this!" Clark implored.

"Shut up and fight!"

He came guns-a-blazing at Clark. He knew he had the advantage at all aspects over his opponent, hence he took none of the caution he would usually do.

Clark was subject to trying to fight for his life again. He knew he can't match Superman in physical, or even mental combat, so he tried to fight him with other means.

"What would Mom and Dad think?!" he shouted as he tried to fend off the incoming blows. Like before though, one hit in every six or seven would get through, then more frequently after that, and before he knew it Clark was well on the way to becoming a punching bag.

"You have to stop, you have the power to undo all this!" Clark managed to scream between parries.

"Stop acting as if you know who I am!" Superman iterated. "You are nothing to me!"

He let out a war cry, prying open Clark's defences and finally landing a critical blow to his abdomen. Clark keeled over, not in the least bit surprised to be tasting his own blood again.

"You should never have come here! Their deaths will be on your hands!" Superman said before pinning Clark down with two legs and an arm, using his dominant hand to strike at his jaw repeatedly, and mercilessly.

Clark decided to use the last of his energy reserves on his heat vision, firing a futile but intense blast at Superman's right eye, finally breaking the siege as Superman let go of him. The brief respite allowed him to get up, he gulped down the mixture of blood and God-knows-what-else that was in his mouth.

"You are in way over your head." Superman mocked.

"Maybe, but you're going to have to try a lot harder to kill me. I have a world I need to get back to, an Earth to protect and serve, and friends who rely on me as I do on them." Clark knew his words were wishful. His bravado at this point was running on fumes that were thinner than his breath. Not even against Darkseid did he feel this outmatched.

"And do you think you do a good job at that? All those people you claim you're protecting, but you know it's stupid and pointless. You and you _league_ might be able to feel good whenever you stop a storm or an earthquake, but every day humans work harder at destroying themselves. War. Terror. Greed. You can't and never will have a hope of stopping that unless you're willing to make the sacrifices I did."

"You lost your family. So did Jor-El and Lara, so did Bruce, so did all our friends and so did millions of people that day. Instead of rising above it all, you turn into darkness and evil. You gave in. Worse still, you drag the one and only person that was the constant good, bright and pure thing in your life into creating this world with you. You're the most powerful man I've ever met, she would've followed you anywhere and this is what you've managed to give to her. She deserves better than this, _Kal-El_. You know she does. You saw it with your own eyes."

Superman's eyes flashed white, but he closed them before they could shoot the deadly beams. He tried to deflect the emotions, tried to pin them down as nonsense, and it worked. At this point, there was no such thing as rational anymore.

"Nothing you showed me is going to stop what I'm going to do to you! I'm going to track your world down, _Clark_ , and I'm going to fix it. I know that it's broken, and I know you and your friends will resist me in their ignorance. But nothing can win against me. As soon as you die here I'm going to open that gate and the armies of New Themyscira and One Earth will come pouring through. You'll curse not sealing your pathway here and instead wasting time trying to show us useless visions. Your Lois, your Bruce, your parents will curse your own virtuous selfishness."

He charged at him, and after an initial grapple Superman eventually had him pinned on all limbs, and a mighty hand gripped his throat. For the first time in his life, Clark felt true despair. If he was to die, everything he loved would be next in the firing line. It was more evident now more than ever that the man if front of him was a monster.

"N-No!" he choked out.

"How does it feel? To be weak? **To fail and not be strong enough to protect all that you love?** " Superman asked sadistically, all the while tightening his grip on Clark's throat.

"Don't do this, please!"

"It feels terrible, doesn't it? Maybe one day you could've understood, but you won't get the chance now. _Die_ , Superman!"

Kal-El charged his heat vision to record capacity, aiming for Clark's forehead. He would execute him by drilling through his cranium.

Clark felt his life slipping away, the memories, the ups and downs. It really did flash in front of him. He looked to the side, and with the dying light he saw Diana. It wasn't so bad, he mused, for her to be the last thing he would ever see.

He closed his eyes.

The next thing he felt was the outpour of warm blood streaming down his cheeks, and the cold, smooth granite floor of the cave.

Superman lay next to him, with Hephaestus' sword clean through his chest.

* * *

Diana watched them fight, well, not 'fight' in so much as she watched a man struggle for his life with everything left to lose. It felt tragic, it felt sorrowful.

It felt like she was watching Superman, the one and only Superman. The kind, wonderful, compassionate and caring Superman she fell in love with a decade ago, the Superman that married another woman.

 _That_ Superman. She was watching him die all over again. Suddenly it hit her, the realisation dawning upon her, that if there was ever going to be an end to all this death, all this despair, that whoever she was left with was not _her_ Superman.

Diana now knew that when that bomb exploded in Metropolis all those years ago, that there was one name missing on the memorial wall in the ruins of the Daily Planet. His soul perished just as easily as the bodies of those who were caught in the blast.

And as she watched Kal-El about to kill the man caught up in all this, the truth came bursting out of the depths of her heart. It was easy to ignore and justify the atrocities she committed when it was only strangers on the other side. She had always tried to live her life with no deceit, but truth in itself can be warped by the reality of the universe around it. Not today though, the absolute truth always had a way of digging itself out. No matter how much she loved him, how much she wished for a new life with him, she knew that she'd already lost her chance.

She was in love with a ghost, and it became more apparent when contrasted to the real man in front of her, and if there was one more thing she could do in this wretched life of hers, it would be the same thing she thought she'd already committed her life to.

It would be to save him.

Diana picked up the magical sword that was forged in the fires of Olympus, tempered with an elemental force that not even the greatest of men can shield against. She felt the leather handle, warm from the usage and the shimmering sharpness of the blade. She pointed it at the one place she knew Kryptonians were most vulnerable. She pointed it at Superman's heart.

* * *

Clark got up from the confusion and came to Superman's side. He saw the blade, and he saw who put it there. He looked up aghast at Diana, and it took a moment for him to completely overcome his shock.

"Oh, God…!" he muttered. In a panicked state, he grasped at his cape and ripped it off his back, he bunched the cloth and tried to staunch the wound. But it was no use, Superman's blood flowed freely.

With the last of his dying breath, his eyes expressed a willingness to pass away. He brought his hand up to grasp at Clark's collar.

Kal-El opened his mouth, now also bathed in blood. "Lo…Lois…don't let her…please…"

Clark had no answer. He just stared in shock as Superman turned his gaze to Diana, and breathed his last. She was crying, her tears from her eyes instantly reminding him of the way blood poured from Superman's open wound.

"Why? Diana, why did you do that for me?" He stood up as Diana fell on her knees to cradle Kal-El as the warmth radiated from his expiring form, her teardrops falling onto his face, his eyes. His heavyset armour, once proud and foreboding, now acted as the receptacle for his blood.

"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry…" she whispered through sobs. "…you deserved so much better…you'll get to see them again, and I promise I'll meet you soon…"

She had clutched him to her, and Clark forcibly tuned out what she was whispering out of reverence. His attention instantly turned to Bruce, not very far away from him. He had a whitewashed look on his face as well. Clark came to help him.

"You need to get to a hospital."

"It can wait. Is he gone?" Bruce asked of his fallen nemesis.

Clark turned his head back. "It's fatal."

Bruce stared solemnly at the sound of Diana's weeping, "Do you know how long we've been fighting this war, Clark? Fighting them? Fighting her?"

"If anything I hope fighting is the last thing you'd want to do after what happened today."

"I just can't believe that's it, I thought the never-ending struggle was just that."

They both looked over at where Diana was kneeling over Superman, she was as vulnerable as a doe.

"You're not going to do anything to her, not whilst I'm here." Clark affirmed.

"I'm not. We were brothers once, it feels like I'm an Abel who somehow got lucky."

"What about your quest for vengeance?"

"There's nothing left to avenge, Clark."

Clark kept her eyes on her. Her tears almost shimmered in the dark cave.

"I wish it was different, I wish I had more time…" he began.

"You did what you could, Clark, some people you just can't save, but I'm sure you'd learnt that already."

Clark helped Bruce limp to the nearest first aid kit, and turned his attention back to Wonder Woman. She had just closed Superman's eyes, reciting the last words for her prayer of a safe trip across the river to Tartarus for him.

"Why did you choose me over him?" Clark finally asked her. "You didn't know me."

Diana wiped her tears, and faced Clark with fierce, forbidden eyes. "I didn't choose anyone, I made a decision to do what was right."

"Why now?" Clark asked pointedly.

"You being here put things in perspective. We were monsters, gods and monsters one and the same. We did so many and we thought we had accomplished so much, but when I saw you on the edge of death I realised it was all a lie. My so-called love for truth was blinded by my love for him."

Clark's voice broke at hearing her pain. "Diana, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry…"

She cut him off, "No, do not apologise for our sins. Kal is at peace now. The world is not, and it's up to the rest of us to at least try to make it right."

Her voice sounded purposeful and motivated, but Clark saw through it. She was grieving inside.

"I'll stay." he replied. "I'll stay with you, and Bruce, and the others. I'll help, I'll do anything I can…"

"No." she cut him off once more, refusing to look straight at his eyes, and pretending not to at all take notice of the beseeching tone in his voice. "This is not your fight, only ours. What I said before still applies, you don't belong here."

"I don't care, I'm here now."

"I'm afraid she's right, Clark." Bruce appeared, walking on a makeshift crutch and with a remote device in his hand. "This is our mess. It's an injustice to take you from your own world to fix one you had no part in creating."

Clark tried to plead his case, "You'll get it done faster with me, and my friends are perfectly capable of taking care of my home."

"Decision's been made, Clark." Bruce replied as a familiar blue field started enveloping Clark like once before.

"No, not yet! Bruce!" In typical Batman sneakiness, he had made sure to activate the transporter whilst he was away.

Diana finally looked him in the eye. "Go home, _Clark_. Don't forget the lessons you have learnt, for I will not. I will bury my losses, and one day I will pay for all the sins I have committed."

Clark stared at her, he noted the steely conviction in her eye and eventually accepted the finality of her words. He wanted badly to stay and help, but when he tried once more he knew he had nothing left to say, he just continued to stare at her as the transistor reached nominal power and surged through him.

He heard her voice one last time.

"When you get back, you'll find her on Themyscira, where the sun meets the sea and the sea meets the Earth."


	10. Chapter 10

**Stay With Me**

"Mom! Mom! Look what I found!"

The little boy ran fast, his little legs blurring as he came out of the tall grass and onto the porch.

"What is it, darling?" She had a tone of utmost tenderness, her eyes shining as her son excitedly came up the stairs with his hands clasped.

"Look!" He opened his hands, and inside was a frog. It seemed unimpressed with the situation.

"Oh! Where did you get that?" She was only half-surprised, the boy had an inquisitive mind, much like his father.

"By the pond. It hopped onto me. Look how slimy it is! You want to touch it? Here." His blue eyes were wide open, enthralled by the little creature.

"Ewwww!" piped the boy's younger sister after she drew her fingertips away. Her cute face creased in some disgust, her brother was always running off and coming back with weird things. She had been perfectly happy sitting on her mother's lap, listening intently as she told her stories.

"You'd best put it back where you found it, honey, its friends are going to miss it."

"Do I have to?" he pouted, looking up at her.

"Yes." She smiled at him, he really did take after his father. "Please?"

"Okay." He turned around and ran back at once, his red cape flowing in the breeze.

"Mommy, can I also have a cape?" the girl asked thoughtfully, watching her brother in the distance. Earlier in the morning the her big brother had borrowed the tablecloth, and put it around his shoulders.

"Of course, sweetheart, do you want to have mine?"

"Really?!" she asked excitedly.

Her mother patted her on her head, full of golden flowing hair. "Of course, my love. But first let me tell you of the story of the princess and the frog."

The girl smiled widely, and sat down on her mother's lap once more.

* * *

Diana woke up in the cold. All the candles were out and her eyes had trouble adjusting to the darkness and she forced them closed again. It had been unusually cold in Themyscira, but none of her sisters had noticed. She reached for a sheet and drew it up to her shoulders, but she couldn't go back to where she was, try as she might.

She didn't want to wake up. Even a peaceful night's sleep alone eluded her.

Her room in Themyscira was much too large, and the palace it was in was much too crowded. She wanted to be alone, alone with her thoughts, her sadness and her dreams. The solitude was the only place she felt she could be in without anyone, or anything coming between her and her grief.

She couldn't really remember it now, but when things were okay and she was still happy she never really gave thought to what she wanted out of the world that was offered to her. She didn't dream of the life she could've had with him, but it seemed that Kal's supposed death made everything stark and clear, she had lost what she had wanted even before she even knew what it was. Maybe it was a cruel trick from Morpheus, or maybe one last gift to ease her pain, but his death brought out the deepest desires from her heart whenever she tried to rest. Things she didn't even dare to hope for assailed her in the night as only sadness enveloped her in the day.

It had been weeks since he'd disappeared, and there was still no sign. She had the League search the whole Earth, the Lanterns query every corner of the known universe and even asked the gods for any inclination of where he was, but nothing. Finally the other founding members voted to call off the search, and announced that Superman was missing with the probability of death likely.

She didn't want to hear it, any of it. There was a falling out at the Watchtower, and Diana argued tooth and nail that efforts to find him never cease. Kal would never give up for any of them, any neither should they. But practical voices simply stated that Superman would not want them to forsake the rest of the world for his own safety, people needed saving and looking out for, and they simply couldn't do that when everyone is committed to a futile search of one man. The League was designed to be something greater than its parts, such that one man or woman's loss could never stop it from doing its purpose, or so everyone argued against her.

Damn them all. She would sooner fight all of them than give up looking for Kal.

In a quiet, understated rage, she left the Watchtower then and there and flew to Themyscira. Her mother tried to console her by saying that Superman lived an honourable life, but he was a mortal and all lives must end. She didn't want to think of it, didn't want to accept it. Everyone who knew him, believed in him thought him dead, and it was only her in denial. She broke down then and there, and flew to a secluded cottage overlooking a marble cliff.

Why couldn't he simply move on from him? She asked herself. They were never lovers, only friends, as close as friends could be. He was always happy for her whenever she said she was seeing someone in her life, always supportive. His death shouldn't affect her this way.

 _"One day, I'd like to settle down. Maybe live on the farm, have little ones running around, doing what my father and his father did before me. I'd need to find someone to help me though, and she's out there somewhere. I'm not in a particular hurry to find her, but when I do, I'll never let go."_

Fresh tears fell from her sapphire blue eyes. She tried to wipe them away but they wouldn't stop. Diana couldn't comprehend how cruel it was that she never had her chance with the kind, caring and generous man who stole her heart.

* * *

"Superman, what brings you here?"

"Forgive me, your majesty, I didn't know where else to go. I have to see her."

"Aren't you aware of the rules we have on Themyscira?" Hippolyta asked accusingly.

"I am, punish me later if you must and I'll gladly accept it, but I have to see Diana. It cannot wait."

She eyed him critically. The man was strong and handsome, she knew that much. She still thought it a possibility that he was here to do damage, history forbade her from considering otherwise. But there was something desperate in his eyes, coupled with the blood on his suit and the wounds he bore, she felt there was something here that she was not privy to.

"We heard reports of your death. Your allies consider you to be deceased. Why should I make liars of them? After all, the punishment for a man setting foot here is clear." Hippolyta countered. She had received the young man in the portal room, with the Royal Guard at her flanks. He didn't fight, nor resist any action against him. He simply stated what he was here for.

Clark looked at her, and bowed his head deeply in respect. "I am at your mercy. Please, I need to see her, your majesty, that is the only thing in my life that I will hold off dying for."

Hippolyta sighed. Her people thought it some sort of signal and drew their swords in unison, but she raised her right hand to stay them. "My daughter has not been herself lately, Superman. If you can find her, do what you must, but bring her back with you. That is an order." She talked with grace and power, and Clark instantly bowed to his knees in front of her.

He daren't look her in the eye, and flew off instantly before the Queen could change her mind.

* * *

Diana watched the inky blue darkness of the clear Themyscira sky give way to the rising sun. Sunrise was often the favourite part of the day for her. A new beginning, a fresh start. But such sentiments rang false today. She couldn't sleep last night, for fear of what she would see in her dreams, and for fear of being torn away and waking up into the world again.

She drew the black drapes and blocked out the young sun's rays. She extinguished the candles, one by one their pulsing luminescence disappeared into wraiths in the night. She pushed aside the silken canopy of that vast, empty bed of hers and climbed under the white sheets. Once she was still and silent, the shadow of melancholy began to settle over her once more.

Diana surrendered to her tiredness at once, and with a single tear in the dark sleep claimed her at once. Almost by default, she began to dream…

 _Kal-El was tearing apart the clouds, an elemental force as he flew, flew so fast that the waters beneath him rippled like tails as he dove under the white cliffs. He saw and knew exactly where he was going, where he needed to be._

 ** _END_**


	11. Chapter 11

_Author's note: I originally edited this part out of the final chapter. I've listened to you the reader and so here it is._

* * *

EPILOGUE

Diana pulled the canopy close, buried herself in a white blanket and shut out her eyes. At the moment she felt that her spirit was going to rest, only then did she hear a knock on the door of the cottage.

"Please leave." Diana said in her language, "I don't want any breakfast."

The door knocked again.

"I asked you to leave me in peace, unless you're my mother you'll obey my command." She reacted more sternly this time.

The door started to open, and Diana went to grab her lasso from the desk. "I asked you nicely…!" she began.

" _Diana_." said the voice that haunted her at night.

Kal stood in the doorway silhouetted by the bright yellow sun behind him. The wood was barely able to frame his stature, his face shadowed between the rising sun and the dark room.

Diana froze in place, unable to register what her eyes and ears were showing her. A few seconds later a single crystal dropped onto her cheek. Whatever torments her mind was going to play out today, she didn't have the strength anymore.

"Diana." he said again, and stepped a little closer. Diana recoiled backwards. This wasn't real, don't let this drag on for any longer she begged. She wanted to wake up. Seeing him now, the prospect of seeing that strong and beautiful face tempered by those soft blue eyes of his, she couldn't take it. It was too much. Soon her eyes ran like rivers.

Clark stopped in place. She was hurting, and he wanted so badly to ease her. His heart twisted out for her. He closed the door behind him and went for the lasso she dropped on floor and placed it around his arm. The power of the cord went through him like a lightning bolt and his knees failed to hold him. It triggered a split-second flashback of everything he saw. Soon his eyes failed to keep the emotions at bay neither, and his own tears appeared. His tears flowed, his eyes gushing like a crystalline heart that had been pierced.

Diana stared as he crouched down in sorrow at the foot of her bed. Suddenly the synapses in her brain fired, all in unison, emboldening her weary heart. Empathy coursed through her like an uncontrolled fire, and her sapphire blue eyes exploded into life. She went to him, on her knees next to him and wrapped her strong arms around his shoulders in an instant.

"Kal?! Oh, Kal, it's you!" she cried in relief. She held onto him for dear life itself, as if the fates were threatening to take him away again.

Clark's arms moved to encompass around her as well, and the lasso became interloped between them, baring their emotions deep and true. "Diana." he whispered softly. He buried his head in her chest, not allowing her to see his sadness, but then she placed her soft strong palms on his cheeks and silently begged him to look up at her. He looked up at her with all the reverence in his heart.

She was still crying, they both were, and her tears bridged the gap between them to fall and settle like dew on his own skin. Diana wiped his away tenderly with her right hand as she caressed him with the other, forsaking her own power for the hope that she could comfort him. Kal was the strongest man she had ever met, not even myths can match his bravery and the gods themselves would envy his kindness. Seeing him like this brought out something in her she didn't even know she was capable of.

"I'm so sorry." Diana heard after a while. She only hugged him stronger, embraced him closer. She thumbed away his tears as she gazed deep at him. Clark brought one of his powerful hands to cover her own, and once more he felt like breaking down upon feeling her vibrant pulse. She was right here next to him, alive and vital but it was as if he'd lose her.

"You were gone from me, Kal, I thought I'd lost you. I thought you'd never come back." she whispered desperately, not bothering to keep up the 'just friends' pretence anymore now that he was here.

Clark found his strength to speak at last. "I'm sorry, I owe you so many explanations. I didn't mean to break down like this."

Diana smiled graciously at him, then brought their faces close, such that no lies could exist between them. "You're here now, Kal, and I'm strong enough to hold you."

She led him up by hand, then helped him to the bed, Diana was by his side the whole while, looming over him like the Angel of Mercy herself.

"You're the only one, you're all I have Diana. I didn't know where else to go." Clark responded. He had moved his arms to frame her gorgeous face. She looked utterly serene to him. She was his oasis, his fortress. The world would burn before he gave up this moment between them.

"You're safe here, Kal. I promise to all my gods, your God, and any others that no harm will come to you." she softly swore, leaning into him. Her eyes showed no deceit, only shelter.

Clark was going to leave it all on the line now, he's been so close to death that not another second would pass before he let her know how much she meant to him. One day, he would tell her everything he saw in as much detail as his imagination could provide, but not today.

"I need you, Diana. I've never felt like this, like I can't live any longer if I didn't get to see you. I'm sorry for disappearing, but you were the only one I knew I could come back to. No one else."

His words warmed her soul, she wanted to tell him that her own heart desired only him as well. "I can't go on either like this, Kal. I can't bear to see you without getting to hold you, I can't be close to you without knowing that I'll get to come home with you. You're all I've thought about lately, and I can't lose you again. I just know I can't."

Clark regarded her as if she was made out of gold. His best friend, his heart and soul. He swore to never leave her again, to always be at her side. "Anything, Diana." he clasped her hands in his tightly, signifying his vow. "Anything you want, anything you need, I'll give it to you. I'm yours now, as long as you need me."

She had never felt so much joy like this, Diana thought. Her dreams came rushing to her and she could sense them blossoming to life in his eyes and touch. She brought her hands up again to smoothly caress his hair, resting on the back of his neck as she held him thoroughly captive.

"Just stay with me, that's all, stay with me."


End file.
